Preamble

The Mouse met at a Quarter before Three of the Clock, Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.

Stockport Extension Bill (by Order),

Head the Third time, and passed.

North Wales Electric Power Bill [Lords] (by Order),

Second Reading deferred till Thursday, 7th June.

Edinburgh Corporation Order Confirmation (No. 2) Bill,

Considered; to be read the Third time To-morrow.

Nottingham Corporation (Trolley Vehicles) Provisional Order Bill,

Read a Second time, and committed.

Oral Answers to Questions — LEAGUE OF NATIONS.

SAAR TEERITORY (PLEBISCITE).

Sir CHARLES CAYZER: 1.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs whether he can make any statement as to the decisions come to by the Council of the League of Nations for the holding of the Saar Plebiscite and for maintaining the authority of the Saar Commission?

The PRIME MINISTER (Mr. Ramsay Mac Donald): On the 19th May the Council of the League decided to adjourn its consideration of the preparatory measures in view of the Saar Plebiscite to its next Extraordinary Session, since the report of the Committee of Three appointed by it in January to consider the matter and to make recommendations was not yet ready. An Extraordinary Session of the Council opened at Geneva to-day and I am not yet in a position to make any statement on this subject.

Mr. MANDER: 5.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he will state the present position in the Saar territory?

The PRIME MINISTER: The purpose of the hon. Member's question is not very clear, but if he has any specific points upon which he desires information I should be glad to supply it if he would put a question down.

PRISONERS (TREATMENT).

Captain CUNNINGHAM - REID: 4.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he will state which nations, if any, have declared their intention to adhere to the code of minimum rules for the treatment of prisoners adopted by the Assembly of the League of Nations in October last?

The PRIME MINISTER: The Secretary-General of the League of Nations, acting on the instructions of the Assembly given at its 14th Session, has approached the Governments of States Members and non Members of the League, and has asked them whether, in view of their existing or proposed laws and regulations, they are in a position to consider the approval and the practical application of these rules in whole or in part. This information is required in order that the next Assembly may be in a position to decide whether it is possible to recommend the Governments of Member States to adopt the rules in question. My hon. Friend will thus understand that there is no question, as yet, of the adherence by any State to these rules, but I may add that His Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom have recently informed the Secretary-General that they approve of these rules, and that they already apply them in practice.

Oral Answers to Questions — DISARMAMENT CONFERENCE.

Mr. OSWALD LEWIS: 2.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if any further progress has been made towards the conclusion of an agreement on disarmament betwen ourselves and other great Powers?

The PRIME MINISTER: As I informed my hon. Friend the Member for St. Pancnas South-West (Mr. Mitcheson) yesterday, the General Commission of the Disarmament Conference only met that day for the first time after a long adjournment.
I regret that I am unable, as yet, to make any statement in regard to the progress made at Geneva.

Mr. LEWIS: Does the Prime Minister's answer mean that, all efforts to secure a general agreement on Disarmament having failed, all that remains is to try to find the least disagreeable method of expressing the fact?

The PRIME MINISTER: No, that is not quite the case.

Mr. HOLFORD KNIGHT: On the contrary, does it not mean that His Majesty's Government are pressing in every way to bring about a solution?

Oral Answers to Questions — UNITED STATES (BRITISH DEBT).

Mr. LEWIS: 3.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he will inform the President of the United States that no further token payment on account of War debt will be made by Great Britain if, despite such payment, this country is to be regarded as a defaulting debtor within the meaning of the Johnson Act?

The PRIME MINISTER: I would refer my hon. Friend to the answer given yesterday to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Cardiff South (Captain A. Evans) by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer, to which I have nothing to add.

Mr. LEWIS: Will this House have an opportunity of expressing an opinion before any further token payment is made, in the circumstances set out in the question on the Paper?

The PRIME MINISTER: Perhaps the hon. Member will renew that question a few days later, when he will see how the situation stands.

Oral Answers to Questions — BRAZIL (ASSYRIAN SETTLEMENT).

Mr. MANDER: 6.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs the present position with regard to arrangements for transferring the Assyrians to Brazil or elsewhere?

The PRIME MINISTER: According to a report submitted to the Council of the League on the 17th May by its Assyrian Committee, the mission which visited Brazil to investigate the scheme for the
settlement of the Assyrians in Parana reported favourably on that scheme. The committee pointed out to the Council, however, that the transfer of so large a population raised problems more difficult than was generally realised; that it was too early therefore to express an opinion whether the scheme for settlement in Brazil could be put into effect; and that the next step would be to enter into detailed negotiations with the Brazilian Government in the hope of working out a plan acceptable to that Government. The committee is to meet again in Geneva this week to consider the matter further.

Oral Answers to Questions — GERMANY (BRITISH SUBJECT'S ARREST).

Mr. ANSTRUTHER-GRAY: 9.
asked the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs if he can state the reasons given by the German Government for the arrest of Mr. Pembroke Stephens, Berlin correspondent of the "Daily Express," on 15th May?

The PRIME MINISTER: I understand that the occasion for Mr. (Stephens's arrest at Aken, near Dessau, on the 15th May was that of suspicion of being engaged in industrial espionage.

Oral Answers to Questions — ROYAL NAVY (MEDITERRANEAN CANTEEN TENANCIES).

Mr. T. WILLIAMS: 10.
asked the First Lord of the Admiralty for how many years the average canteen tenancy in Malta had been held before their transfer in June, 1918; and whether contracts were carried out satisfactorily prior to the War?

The FIRST LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Sir Bolton Eyres Monsell): We are all very glad to see the hon. Member in his place again.
The duration of the tenancy agreements varied considerably from a few months to several years. It is therefore not practicable to compute their average period. So far as is known, the agreements in force before the War were carried out satisfactorily under the conditions then obtaining.

Mr. WILLIAMS: 11.
asked the First Lord of the Admiralty if he is aware that the transfer of the Mediterranean canteen
tenancies to the Army and Navy Canteen Board in 1918 was a temporary war-time measure, and that the secretary to the commander-in-chief stated, on 8th March, 1916, this course had been decided upon on account of the scarcity of certain foodstuffs, the restriction imposed upon exports from Malta, and the increasing difficulties encountered by private firms in meeting requirements; and, in view of this, will he state what opportunities have been offered to previous tenants to tender for contracts since the War?

Sir B. EYRES MONSELL: The canteens in the Mediterranean were taken over by the Navy and Army Canteen Board in 1918 owing to the inability of the Maltese canteen tenants to meet requirements satisfactorily under the conditions then obtaining. The statement attributed to the secretary to the commander-in-chief doubtless had reference to these conditions. In 1920, when the policy was reviewed by the three Service Departments, it was unanimously agreed that the tenant system should not be revived, and that all the canteens then managed by the Navy and Army Canteen Board should be taken over permanently by that organisation, which was reconstituted as the Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes. As the tenant system has thus been abolished, no opportunity can arise for previous tenants to tender for agreements. Considerable purchases of provisions are made, however, by the Victualling Yard, by His Majesty's ships direct, and by the Navy, Army and Air Force Institutes, from Maltese traders.

Mr. WILLIAMS: Do we understand from the First Lord that no opportunity is ever likely to be given to the previous holders of these tenancies to obtain the old business again?

Sir B. EYRES MONSELL: No, sir, I do not think there is the slightest chance of going back.

Mr. HERBERT WILLIAMS: Will the right hon. Gentleman take note of this expression of preference for private enterprise as against nationalisation?

Oral Answers to Questions — EAST AFRICA (ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE).

Sir ROBERT HAMILTON: 12.
asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies
whether the report of the commission of inquiry into the administration of justice in criminal matters in East Africa has now boon considered; and if the report will be made available for Members of the House?

The SECRETARY of STATE for the COLONIES (Sir Philip Cunliffe-Lister): Certain questions arising out of my consideration of this report have been referred to the Conference of East African Governors. The report will be presented to Parliament in the course of a few weeks.

Oral Answers to Questions — TRADE AND COMMERCE.

COLONIES (JAPANESK IMPOETS).

Captain PETER MACDONALD: 13.
asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies if he can now state what action has been taken by any of the Colonies with regard to the imposition of quotas upon Japanese imports?

Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: As my hon. and gallant Friend will appreciate, some time is necessary for the preparation and passing of the legislation required to bring the quota system into operation and it is not yet possible to prepare any general summary of the action taken, but every effort is being made to bring the system into operation with the least possible delay.

Captain MACDONALD: Can the right hon. Gentleman say which Colonies have indicated their desire to adopt the amendments?

Sir P. CUNLIFFE-LISTER: No, Sir, I could not say that at this moment, but I can say that the reply has been generally satisfactory.

SHIPPING INDUSTRY.

Mr. H. WILLIAMS: 18.
asked the President of the Board of Trade if his attention has been drawn to the fact that of the entrances from and clearances to European ports, out of 17,800,000 tons of shipping using United Kingdom ports in the first four months of this year, no less than 9,530,000 tons, or 53½ per cent. was foreign; and what steps he proposes to take to improve the British share of shipping using United Kingdom ports?

Lieut.-Colonel J. COLVILLE (Secretary, Overseas Trade Department): Yes,
Sir, and I should perhaps draw my hon. Friend's attention to the fact that the corresponding percentage for foreign vessels for the year 1913 was 52.8 per cent. and, therefore, only slightly less than the percentage for the first four months of this year. The question of assisting British shipping is under the urgent consideration of the Government.

COCOA BUTTER (IMPORTS).

Mr. H. WILLIAMS: 19.
asked the President of the Board of Trade if his attention has been drawn to the fact that the imports of cocoa butter have increased from 2,800,000 lbs. in the first four months of 1933 to 4,977,000 lbs. in the first four months of this year; and, as all this cocoa butter can be produced in this country from Empire cocoa beans, what steps he proposes to take to deal with the growing foreign competition?

Lieut.-Colonel COLVILLE: I am aware that the figures are substantially as stated by my hon. Friend. Cocoa butter is only one of the constituents of the cocoa bean, and the demand for it in this country is in excess of the demand for the other constituents. In these circumstances the requirements of the United Kingdom manufacturer can be better met by importing the extra cocoa butter than by importing the raw bean and exporting or destroying the other surplus constituents.

LEVANT FAIR

Captain P. MACDONALD: 21.
asked the Secretary to the Overseas Trade Department if he can make any statement with regard to the results of the enlarged Levant Fair at Tel Aviv, Palestine, which was due to close on 26th May; and whether he has any information as to the amount of orders for British goods which have resulted therefrom?

Lieut.-Colonel COLVILLE: I would refer my hon. Friend to the reply given to the hon. Member for Whitechapel and St. George's (Mr. Janner) on Thursday, the 10th May. No further information is yet available.

INDIA TEXTILE AMENDMENT ACT.

Mr. CHORLTON: 22.
asked the Secretary of State for India if he is aware that in the India Textile Amendment Act, 1934, an alteration has been made to Class 158 J which will have a serious
effect upon the trade between Lancashire and India; and what he proposes to do regarding it?

The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for INDIA (Mr. Butler): The India Textile Amendment Act, 1934, as a whole is satisfactory to this country. On the particular point to which my hon. Friend refers representations wore unsuccessfully made to the Government of India by His Majesty's Government, but my hon. Friend will not overlook the fact that this country does actually enjoy a preferential advantage of 10 per cent. under this head, which is a gain as compared with the position as it existed until quite recently.

Oral Answers to Questions — NAVAL AND MILITAEY PENSIONS AND GRANTS.

Mr. SMEDLEY CROOKE: 16.
asked the Minister of Pensions how many disabled men were receiving a course of inpatient treatment at the end of April, 1934, and the number of applicants who have been refused treatment allowances?

The MINISTER of PENSIONS (Major Tryon): At the end of April last, approximately 2,600 officers and men were in receipt of in-patient treatment, apart from cases in mental hospitals. The great majority of these would be in receipt of treatment allowances, but I have no record of the precise number who were found ineligible for them.

Mr. SMEDLEY CROOKE: 17.
asked the Minister of Pensions bow many first claims to pension have been received during the 12 months ended 30th April, 1934; and of that number how many claims have been admitted and how many have been rejected?

Major TRYON: 3,550 fresh applications in respect of disablement were received during the year referred to. In the same period 300 claims were recognised by way of either monetary award and/or medical treatment according to the circumstances of the case.

Mr. SMEDLEY CROOKE: May I ask whether those who have been rejected have any right of appeal to the appeal tribunal?

Major TRYON: No, Sir, as the hon. Member knows, they have not, but the present Government, like their predecessors,
feel that the present arrangement is best both in the interests of the State and of the ex-service men.

Mr. DAVID DAVIES: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, while disabled men have been receiving treatment and since their discharge their wives and children have had to be maintained by the Poor Law authorities?

Major TRYON: That supplementary question arises out of the previous question, but not out of this question.

Oral Answers to Questions — AGRICULTURE (BUTTEE IMPORTS).

Mr. H. WILLIAMS: 20.
asked the Minister of Agriculture what steps he proposes to take to protect the British dairying industry from foreign competition, having regard to the fact that the imports of foreign butter were 1,233,000 cwt. in the first four months of 1934, as compared with 1,121,000 cwt. in the same period of 1933?

The MINISTER of AGRICULTURE (Mr. Elliot): I would refer my hon. Friend to the statement I made on 22nd February last with regard to the Government's milk policy. The Financial Resolution covering the proposals I then outlined will come up for consideration by the House to-morrow.

Mr. WILLIAMS: As the right hon. Gentleman's statements have indicated that the trouble is due to increasing Dominion imports, and these figures show that there is an increase of imports from foreign countries, does not this call for reconsideration on his part?

Mr. ELLIOT: I am not at all sure to what my hon. Friend is referring, but an opportunity for debate will arise to-morrow, and we shall then be very glad to meet that and other points.

Mr. HASLAM: May I ask whether the right hon. Gentleman is bearing in mind the considerable increase in the imports of butter from the Netherlands, in view of the negotiations going on with that country?

Mr. ELLIOT: Certainly, all those points are being borne in mind. The milk policy which has been outlined in the House is designed to raise the low level of prices, from whatever cause arising.

Mr. DAVID GRENFELL: Is it not the case that there is a corresponding increase in the imports of butter from the Dominions as compared with the figures given in the question?

Mr. ELLIOT: It would not be advisable to debate that matter at Question Time, but we can go into it to-morrow.

Oral Answers to Questions — DERELICT AREAS.

Mr. ANSTRUTHER-GRAY: 23.
asked the Minister of Labour whether the Government are yet in a position to make a further announcement with regard to the relief of the derelict areas?

The PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY to the MINISTRY of LABOUR (Mr. R. S. Hudson): No Sir, not yet.

Mr. BATEY: When does the Parliamentary Secretary expect to be in a position to make a statement; and is it the intention of the Government to hurry up the commissioners' reports, so that the House can debate the matter before the Summer Recess?

Mr. HUDSON: The reports have not yet been received, and it is obviously undesirable that the investigation should be unduly hurried.

Mr. BATEY: Can the hon. Gentleman say when it is expected that the reports will be received, so that we can debate them?

Mr. HUDSON: When the investigation is completed.

Oral Answers to Questions — PRECIOUS METALS.

Captain CUNNINGHAM - REID: 24.
asked the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he proposes to introduce legislation to carry into effect the recommendation of the Commissioner of Police of the Metropolis, in his report for the year 1933, that it should be made an offence for dealers in gold and silver articles to break up or melt articles brought into their possession within a stated period, such as seven days?

The SECRETARY of STATE for the HOME DEPARTMENT (Sir John Gilmour): I would refer my hon. and gallant Friend to the reply which I gave on the 15th instant to my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Mr. Lewis).

Oral Answers to Questions — HIS MAJESTY'S LIEUTENANTS.

Sir PARK GOFF: 25.
asked the Home Secretary whether he is aware that the official designation or title of those of His Majesty's Lieutenants for English counties who are not also peers is Lord Lieutenant; and will he notify the local authorities concerned when cases in which the correct designation is not employed come to the notice of the Home Office?

Sir J. GILMOUR: The title "Lieutenant" is statutory, being used in Acts of Parliament from the 16th century onwards, and the designation officially used in all cases is "His Majesty's Lieutenant of the County of" The style "Lord Lieutenant" is, however, commonly used colloquially and in general correspondence, and is applied to the holders of such office whether they are peers or commoners. I do not think it necessary to communicate with local authorities in the matter.

Sir ARTHUR MICHAEL SAMUEL: Am I correct in understanding my right hon. Friend to say that, in describing as "Lord Lieutenant" one of His Majesty's Lieutenants of a county who is not a peer, the correct legal title is employed?

Sir J. GILMOUR: That title is commonly used, I think. It has grown up through long custom.

Oral Answers to Questions — POLITICAL PARTIES (UNIFORMS).

Mr. VYVYAN ADAMS: 26.
asked the Home Secretary whether any and, if so, what action is now contemplated by the Government in regard to the wearing of political uniforms?

Sir J. GILMOUR: The Government have been giving careful consideration to the question whether it is necessary, in the public interests, to propose legislation for the purpose of dealing with certain undesirable new developments on the part of political organisations and, should the occasion arise, they will not hesitate to submit to Parliament such proposals as they deem necessary for the purpose of dealing with any activities, which constitute a threat to public order or security, by strengthening the law relating to the preservation of public order. Developments are being closely watched.

Mr. PETHERICK: Is the Home Secretary aware that, if the suggestion contained in the question were carried out, it would merely have the effect of advertising a faction?

Mr. BERNAYS: Will the right hon. Gentleman bear in mind the example of foreign countries where political uniforms have been suppressed without any evil repercussions?

Mr. ADAMS: Would it not at least be more decent to limit the wearing of blouses to the female sex?

BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE.

Mr. ATTLEE: May I ask the Prime Minister what business he proposes to take on Friday?

The PRIME MINISTER: On Friday, the business proposed is the Licensing (Permitted Hours) Bill, Second Reading: the Palestine Loan Bill, Committee stage; and the Milk (Money) Resolution. Report stage.
The Licensing Bill is being presented to-day, and arrangements have been made for copies to be made available to Members in the Vote Office at five o'clock this evening.

Mr. ISAAC FOOT: I understand that the Bill to which the Prime Minister refers is to be made available this evening. Does he think that that is an adequate opportunity for the consideration of the Bill? We are not aware of its terms, but it raises a matter of some public importance, and the Debate is to take place on Friday morning. That gives, I suggest, very little opportunity for consultation——[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh!"] I assume that, before the Second Reading of an important Measure, the public of this country have a right to be consulted, and this gives no opportunity for that consultation. I should have thought that, if the opportunity for consultation had been given, it might have shortened the Debate in this House.

Captain P. MACDONALD: Can the Prime Minister say how many Clauses the Bill contains?

The PRIME MINISTER: On the point of consultation, I think that, if my hon. Friend will cast his mind back, he will recollect that notice of this Bill was given
on the 17th of this month, before the House rose, and its contents were indicated. There is no extension, and I think my hon. Friend will find, when he sees the Bill, that it may very well be taken on the notice we have given.

LICENSING (PERMITTED HOURS) BILL,

"to make provision with regard to the power to make, and the validity of, directions under paragraph (b) (i) of the proviso to sub-section (1) of section one of the Licensing Act, 1921, as respects a part of the year only, and to the power to fix, and the validity of decisions fixing, the permitted hours on weekdays where such directions are so made," presented by Sir John Gilmour; supported by Sir Godfrey Collins, Mr. Douglas Hacking, and Mr. Skelton; to be read a Second time upon Friday, and to be printed. [Bill 124.]

ELECTRICITY SUPPLY BILL [Lords].

Read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Monday next, and to be printed. [Bill 127.]

LAW REFORM (MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS) BILL [Lords].

Read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Monday next, and to be printed. [Bill 126.]

Orders of the Day — SUPPLY.

[6TH ALLOTTED DAY.]

Considered in Committee.

[Captain BOURNE in the Chair.]

CIVIL ESTIMATES, 1934.

CLASS IV. BOARD OF EDUCATION.

Motion made, and Question proposed,
That a sum, not exceeding £26,604,018, be granted to His Majesty, to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending on the 31st day of March, 1935, for the Salaries and Expenses of the Board of Education, and of the various Establishments connected therewith, including sundry Grants-inAid."— [Note.—£15,500,000 has been voted on account.]

3.8 p.m.

The PARLIMENTARY SECRETARY to the BOARD of EDUCATION (Mr. Ramsbotham): The Memorandum on the Board of Education Estimates for 1934 shows a total of £42,104,018. As a result, however, of the partial restoration of the cuts in teachers' salaries, announced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer last April, there will be a further addition of about £1,500,000. That addition is not, of course, shown on the Estimates, but the real total is somewhat over £43,500,000. I need hardly say that my Noble Friend the President and myself were highly gratified that the Chancellor of the Exchequer was able to restore half the cut in the teachers' salaries, and I feel sure that the teaching profession will much appreciate the principle which he laid down, that the particular special measures taken in 1931 should be dealt with first. Apart from that addition, the net increase in the Department's Estimates this year is £43,117, and, in view of the fact that there is such a small increase on so large a total, I do not suppose that the Committee will expect any very startling development of educational policy to be announced. I shall be surprised if anything sensational or dramatic is deemed to be contained in the observations which I am about to make.
The figure reflects the policy which the Board have consistently pursued since 1931 of sure and steady progress, and of
employing resources which are by no means unlimited in securing those aims which are most needed. I will not pretend that that has been an easy task. It has been difficult. Our passage through the years has in some ways been a kind of educational Odyssey, steering between Scylla and Charybdis so as to avoid the savage fangs of the one and the unfathomable depths of the other. Sirens too, have not been lacking, to lure us from our path with seductive voice and counsel. The Committee will recollect that, when confronted with similar enticements, that much-enduring man Odysseus bade his crew bind him to the mast with ropes. My Noble Friend the President of the Board of Education has not found it necessary to take precisely similar steps, but I am sure that he has used all his powers of restraint, control and moderation to save us from analagous perils.
In view of the small change in the Board's Estimate compared with last year, I do not propose on this occasion to undertake the same exhaustive analysis of the figures that I made last year. I propose, first of all, to deal with the reason for the small increase, and at greater length to deal with the general questions of policy which I think may be of more interest to the Committee. The Board's Estimate shows a reduction of grants to the local education authorities of £116,000 and of £66,525 to bodies other than education authorities. Economically-minded critics will probably be disappointed to learn that these small savings have been more than counterbalanced by the increase in teachers' pensions of £243,700. That increased cost will grow automatically for many years. We have also to remember that the Teachers' Superannuation Act, which pensions teachers on back service without any contribution from them, has been estimated to be a free gift to the teaching profession from the State equivalent to an annuity of about £4,500,000 for 40 years.
The reduction in grant of £66,000 to bodies other than local education authorities is mainly due to a reduction in the number of students in the training colleges for teachers. A few years ago the service was considerably over-recruited in consequence of an anticipation of the raising of the school-leaving age,
but that anticipation was not realised. There has consequently been a fall in the number of children in the schools. In view of those two facts, it has not only been possible but necessary to slow down the rate of recruiting to the training colleges. The Board pays capitation grant in respect of students to the training colleges, and that amount has therefore been decreased pro rata. The reduction of £116,000 in the grants to the local education authorities is due to two factors; first, to the increase in the product of the 7d. rate which, under our somewhat complicated grant formula, serves to reduce the amount payable by the Board to local education authorities; and, secondly, to the reduction in the average attendance in the elementary schools. Part of the grant which is paid by the Board to the local education authorities is based upon the average numbers in attendance and as we have estimated this year for a reduction of 80,000 children the Board's grant will be correspondingly reduced.
But increases of cost due to teachers' pensions, and decreases due to the gymnastics of the grant formula do not in themselves give a good picture of the realities of the position. If you want a better picture hon. Members should turn to the estimated expenditure of the local education authorities for this year which shows an increase of £185,000. It is estimated that the Exchequer and the rates between them this year will have to find about £82,000,000. Those who from time to time declare that education is progressively starved, are using somewhat immoderate language. I do not believe that any other country in the world has so successfully maintained and increased expenditure in the sphere of educational service as our own. It was only a few years before the War that Mr. Asquith, then Chancellor of the Exchequer in the Liberal Government of 1906, characterised the Board's Estimate as colossal. I have looked up the figure to see what it was; it was about £13,000,000. Faced this year with an expenditure from the Exchequer alone of £42,000,000 I have not ventured to inquire from my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer what would be the appropriate epithet.
I am well aware that an expenditure of £82,000,000 between ourselves and the local authorities is not enough to please
all the friends of education, and I doubt if any figure ever will be. Given a completely free hand, it is highly probable that I should produce a much increased Estimate, but education is only one of the many services which require the support of the taxpayer and the ratepayer. The hon. Baronet the hon. Member for South-West Bethnal Green (Sir P. Harris), who is an educationist of repute and speaks on educational matters as the mouthpiece of that section of the Liberal party with which he is associated, said in this House a month or two ago:
The needs of national defence are always paramount."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 26th April, 1934; col. 1920, Vol. 288.]
I infer from that statement that in his view the needs of the Army, Navy and Air Force have a prior claim to our national resources, and must take precedence over the needs of education.

Mr. COVE: He does not recognise that statement.

Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: It is in the OFFICIAL REPORT. In the past 12 months the Board have been urged simultaneously by educationists to restore teachers' salaries; to raise the school-leaving age; to give maintenance allowances, I assume without exemptions; to press on with reorganisation; to build more nursery schools; to reduce the size of classes; to increase the number of teachers; to provide free milk for all school children and to give free dinners to all children of poor parents. Many of these reforms are desirable and some of them are already under way; to carry them all out in the immediate future would require a surplus very much larger than that which the Chancellor of the Exchequer was able to show in last April.
Consequently, I cannot estimate for the immediate realisation of all those projects, but I propose to discuss with the Committee the policy of the Board with regard to several of them. Unhappily, I am debarred by the rules of order from discussing one which is occupying a good deal of attention, the raising of the school-leaving age, as to raise it on a national basis would require legislation. I do not gather that educational authorities are by any means unanimous in the policy of raising it piecemeal up and down the country by means of by-laws. For instance, my own county of Lan
cashier has definitely decided against that solution of the problem, and I believe the London County Council has done likewise.
But I propose to deal with one question which is in many ways closely related to the problem, namely, reorganisation under the Hadow scheme. The Board has from time to time been subjected to criticism on the ground that, while favouring the. adoption of reorganisation throughout the country, it has in its administration restricted the building of new schools, except where countervailing economies have been secured, in order to meet the pressing needs of newly developed areas. But it seems to me that that criticism ignores the crisis that we were faced with in 1931 and the fact that even last year, when framing these Estimates, we could not foresee with certainty the recovery that has taken place. In spite of those difficulties, we have made very substantial progress with reorganisation throughout the country, and the figures I am going to give will emphasise that fact. In March, 1931, there were 1,350 departments qualified as senior containing 319,000 children of 11 and over. In March, 1933, there were 2,340 senior departments containing 700,000 children of 11 and over. So that in two years the number of children within the ambit of the senior schools has more than doubled and progress is continuing steadily. In the year ended 31st March last we approved the building of 86 new schools and the enlargement of 118 more, and we have approved 91 premises and equipment for instruction in handicraft and domestic subjects, besides a larger number of proposals for rebuilding and altering schools and for obtaining new sites. The position to-day is that 50 per cent. of the children of 11 and over are now in reorganised schools and, if you include juniors and infants, as we ought to, the proportion is 60 per cent. I anticipated that during this Debate I might hear something about the Board having placed an embargo on new school building. In view of those figures, if anyone has prepared a speech containing that allegation, there will still be time to substitute some other criticism perhaps less damaging but better justified.
In that connection, I should like to say a word about capital expenditure. These Estimates are no index of the capital
expenditure to be approved during the coming year. The loan charges and maintenance charges for the next 12 months cannot figure in the Board's Estimates until next year. During the last two years, it is true that we have had to conserve our resources, but, in spite of that, our figure of capital expenditure has amounted to over £7,750,000. That is a remarkably good record considering that at no time during that period did we anticipate the national recovery that has taken place. As regards future capital expenditure, it must be borne in mind that these Estimates cannot in the nature of things reflect the expenditure which may or may not be incurred in the next 12 months. All proposals for such expenditure which may be put forward, and which may be necessary, will be sympathetically considered, particularly those that further the policy of reorganisation.
The Committee will appreciate that it is difficult, in developing our scheme of reorganisation, to continue at all times the same rate of progress as we have made in the past, because those areas which lend themselves most easily to reorganisation should make the most headway, but we are now coming to be left with the more difficult cases. We are approaching, as it were, the hard core of the problem. For instance, take the very difficult position of the voluntary schools, a difficulty constantly, consistently and conveniently ignored by the Board's critics. In March, 1933, in the council schools only 32 per cent. of the pupils were still in unreorganised departments. The corresponding figure in the voluntary schools was 58 per cent. That shows that the problem is becoming more and more a voluntary school problem. But it is also a rural problem, both as regards non-provided and provided schools. It is a rural problem because in the country areas it is naturally difficult to get suitable accommodation in many cases for central schools, and there are also the geographical difficulties of disstance and transport. I note, in passing, that in the Liberal party's recent and stirring "Address to the Nation" it is laid down that the next step in the development of the education system should be to carry forward the reorganisation programme based upon the Hadow Report. It is always agreeable, and indeed
reassuring, to be advised to take a step which you have already taken, and the Committee will be gratified and relieved to know that the Government are doing and have been doing in the past precisely what the Liberal party recommend should be done in the future.
Now I will say a word on three or four subjects before I come to one that I shall have to deal with at greater length. With regard to the black-list schools, we are proceeding with their removal from the list. Last year we removed 114, and plans have been approved for the removal of 163 more. To a considerable extent this is a voluntary school problem, because of the capital expenditure involved in the removal of these schools. It is also a problem of the congested urban areas and of the practical impossibility of improving schools because of the great difficulty of getting appropriate sites. The fact remains that in December last two-thirds of the worst of these schools had been removed from the black list.
As regards large classes, there is the point of view which I heard the other day of a child who was looking through the railings of a London school playground and, when asked by a kind-hearted soul why he did not go inside, replied: "Too many teachers." On the other hand, the point of view with which I am chiefly concerned is naturally that of the teachers. It sounds a platitude, but one of the greatest benefits that we could achieve would be to ensure that all teachers are asked to manage classes of manageable proportions. There has been a considerable fall in the school population, which will help in that direction.
We are making progress in the reduction of classes throughout the country. At present the average number of pupils to teachers in elementary schools is 29. I believe that involves a proportion of teachers to children higher than any that we have had hitherto. We have recently made a special investigation in the areas of those authorities where unduly large classes were known or suspected and, as a result, we have been able to make improvements in two-thirds of the cases, and in the area of another 100 authorities we have also carried out striking improvements in that direction. The Committee are aware that we are reducing the number of teachers this year consequent upon the fall in the school population,
but I can assure them that the reduction which will take place will certainly not be proportionate to the reduction in the number of children. The Committee will also realise that large classes are in many cases due to unsuitable accommodation, and that is the case very often of the voluntary school where it is not possible to provide additional accommodation for the children. At the same time, we are making progress. It is not likely to be sensational, but we are gradually ameliorating the position step by step.
Part of the demand for smaller classes arises naturally from a desire to employ more teachers. Last year when I spoke on these Estimates I admitted that my Noble Friend and I were very anxious with regard to the position of the large number of students coming out from the training colleges that summer, and I am glad to say that the position of those students is very much better than was anticipated. The number who completed their training last July was about 8,600, compared with an average of preceding years of about 7,500. By December last all but some 1,400 had obtained posts, and, from the notifications of employment which we have received from time to time since, that number has been reduced to about 800. Nobody wants to see a single competent teacher out of a job, but, even if it be assumed that all the 800 are still seeking employment—and it is not a just assumption, as it very often happens that a teacher just coming out of college is not prepared to accept the first job that offers, but waits for something more suitable—the position is much more reassuring than was at one time anticipated.

Mr. COVE: Those are the figures for last year.

Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: Yes. This summer the output of the training colleges will be 1,000 less than in 1933. I think that, as the result of the prudence which we have exercised, we shall find that the unemployment position among the teachers is certainly not serious. We are also steadily endeavouring to obtain an improvement in the quality of staff and are increasing the proportion of certificated teachers to the number of teachers of other grades.
I now come to a subject which I know to be dear to the hearts of all parties— the question of the physical condition of
the children in our schools. I am well aware that there is an impression in many quarters that the physical condition of the children is deteriorating in consequence of prolonged economic distress. For instance, an hon. Member opposite a short while ago stated in this House that:
We are hearing almost every day statements of medical officers of health up and down the country that the health of the children is declining, mainly in families where unemployment is rife."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 23rd April, 1934: col. 1414, Vol. 288.]
A statement of that kind should be received with considerable caution unless supported by the clearest of evidence. The reports which I have received from up and down the country certainly do not confirm it. I cannot quote all these reports, and I know that if I quote any particular one I shall be told that I am selecting it for my own purposes, but I must draw the attention of the Committee to the report of the school medical officer for the North Riding of Yorkshire dated February, 1934. The area in question is partly agricultural and partly industrial, containing as it does towns like Thornaby and Eston near Middlesbrough which have suffered a great deal from industrial distress. According to this report, out of 13,000 children medically examined, there were only seven really bad cases, and the number of those children pronounced subnormally nourished declined from 6.64 per 1,000 in 1930 to 3.97 in 1933. The school medical officer writes:
Malnutrition, the sequence of absolute lack of food, was not established. On the other hand, and as so often reported, the real cause appeared to be improper feeding, there was a sufficiency of food of a kind, but of the wrong type; there is also the malnourished child from the home of the well-to-do, a condition often associated with physical ill-health.
He goes on to quote a report from the school medical inspector for Thornaby and Eston, who writes:
There has been great depression throughout my area. About 60 per cent. of the men are unemployed, but an amazingly high standard of nutrition is maintained. The few that are under-fed do not suffer from lack of quantity but of quality of food, and this is not because of poverty.
I am not quoting that area as typical of the whole country. It clearly is not, for the percentage of malnutrition is not so
low in the country as a whole. I quote it for this reason. It is apparently not generally realised that malnutrition may and obviously does occur in certain cases, not on account of poverty, but on account of unsuitable feeding or organic defects and delicacy. For example, from a recent investigation which was carried out, it was found to be comparatively rare for the brothers and sisters of a malnourished child to show any signs of mal-nourishment.
As regards the country as a whole, the figures of malnutrition show very little change from last year. In 1931 the number per 1,000 was 11.2, in 1932 it was 10.7 and in 1933 it was 11.1. There is just over 1 per cent. of the children coming within that category and it would certainly be unreasonable to draw any inference from the fractional increase in 1933 as compared with 1932, but, nevertheless, 10 per thousand are 10 too many. Increasing and energetic steps are being taken to combat this evil. The principal factor in the fight to check malnutrition so far as the Board of Education are concerned is obviously the provision of meals by local education authorities. This year 190 out of 316 authorities have exercised the powers under the school feeding Sections of the Education Act, and it is expected that 10 more are shortly to adopt those powers. Those authorities cover about 70 per cent. of the school population of England and Wales, and, as they are almost entirely authorities in industrial areas, somewhere between 90 and 100 per cent. of the children in industrial areas are covered by authorities which exercise those powers. The others are mainly in rural areas, in seaside towns, or small country towns where our experience goes to show that the problem of malnutrition is of small or negligible proportions.
The Board has not allowed the financial stringency of the time to impede the desires of local authorities to spend money on the provision of meals, on which they pay the grant at the rate of 50 per cent. In 1928 the net expenditure of the authorities on this service was £227,000; last year it was £560,000. In 1928 the number of authorities exercising their powers in this matter was 145; last year it was 190; and this number is to be increased by about 10 more. In February of this year the authorities were feeding
about 292,000 children either with ordinary meals or milk and about 212,000 of these were being fed free of charge. The point of these figures is that, although only 1 per cent. of the public elementary school children are reported to be suffering from definite malnutrition, free meals and milk are being provided for over 4 per cent. In addition, there are about 900,000 children receiving one-third of a pint of milk daily for the payment of one penny under voluntary schemes organised by the National Milk Publicity Council.
It has been represented to me that all local education authorities should be urged to provide free dinners for the children of the poorer classes. In view of the large expense which such a proposal would involve, I do not think it could be justified unless it were clearly established that the existing permissive arrangements are inadequate. I do not think that is the case. It is the function of local education authorities not to relieve poverty but to ensure that the children coming to school are not prevented by lack of food from getting the full benefit of the education provided. To say that all poor children, irrespective of their physical condition, should be fed at the expense of educational funds is to imply that the resources available for the relief of poverty and distress in other directions are insufficient. I cannot accept that suggestion. The principle is that expenditure on the provision of meals out of educational funds should be related to the educational capacity of the children and should be based on a selection by school medical officers of the children, supplemented by reports from their teachers. Such selection should include not only children definitely malnourished but children who also show any symptoms of sub-normal nutrition.
To make the provision of meals universal for all poor children would contradict that principle and would impose on local education authorities the duty of supplementing out of educational funds the assistance given from other sources for the relief of economic distress. In any event, the experience of some of the most distressed areas shows that it is possible to keep malnutrition in check by providing dinners or even milk only
under a system of medical selection, which would include all children suffering from subnormal nutrition but not those children who, though poor, are able to take advantage of the education offered to them. I hope the Committee will forgive me for the time I have spent on this exceptionally important matter which I can assure them is one which is constantly engaging the attention of my Noble Friend and myself.
I have seen from time to time in the educational Press suggestions that the Board is placing an embargo on various services for improving the physical condition of the children. Let me say at once that no embargo has or is being placed on the school medical service. Last year we approved 17 proposals for new clinics and 124 forms of inspection and treatment, including the appointment of additional medical officers, dentists or specialists, school nurses, the equipment of clinics and many other forms of expenditure, and this year we have allowed in the Estimates for an increase in the cost of the school medical service.
I come to secondary education. The Committee will be glad to know that the numbers in our secondary schools are steadily rising. In October there were 8,000 more in our secondary schools than in the previous year, and the fact that there were no less than 1,100 new admissions is remarkable because in June, 1933, there were 80,000 fewer children between the ages of 10 and 12 in our elementary schools than in 1932. The remainder of the increase is accounted for mainly by a sensible tendency on the part of the children to remain at school unless there is suitable employment available for them.
Let me say one word about Circular 1421, of which no doubt the Committee has heard. That circular substituted special places for free places. Children who win special places are now admitted free or their parents pay either a part or the whole of the fee according to their means. There are two points to be considered now that we are able for the first time to see the effect of that policy. In the first place, although there has been a decrease of 80,000 in the number of children between the ages of 10 and 12 between June, 1932, and June, 1933, and although there has been an increase in
the average rate of fees charged, yet over 1,100 more children have been admitted to our secondary schools. The second point is that the percentage of pupils paying no fees has decreased from 51 to 49 but the percentage of those who are paying full fees has also declined from 48 to 42. And whereas 51 per cent. were admitted free in 1932, 58 per cent. in 1933 were paying either no fee or partial fee. I recollect that there were some very gloomy forecasts made both in and outside the House when Circular 1421 first saw the light of day. False prophets are treated much more tenderly to-day than in times gone by, and I will only say to hon. Members opposite in the words of the late Lord Balfour:
They prophesied and they were subject to the weakness of all prophets; the event contradicted them.
A word as to technical education. The Board is pursuing its policy of endeavouring to secure co-operation between neighbouring authorities in important industrial areas. The Yorkshire Council for Further Education has now been established for several years and has carried out a successful policy of regional coordination in its area. The Union of Lancashire and Cheshire Institutes is adopting a similar policy, but there are other large industrial and commercial districts where co-ordination of this kind is desirable. For instance, there is the West Midlands, the great industrial area between Coventry and Wolverhampton. In that area the Board has been engaged with the local education authorities in formulating a scheme for the co-ordination of technical education. There is also the area in South Wales, in which the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones) knows I have taken a personal interest. Progress there is much slower than I could have hoped, and perhaps hon. Members who represent constituencies in that area might help me and reinforce my inadequate powers of per suasion. Regional co-ordination does not only apply to technical education but also to art instruction in its relation to industries which depend on design and fine craftsmanship, such as textiles, pottery, glass and so on.
The Board has had the advantage of a series of conferences with the Industrial Art Committee of the Federation of British Industries, and one of the matters discussed has been the regional co-ordination
of art instruction. We hope to set on foot a policy of voluntary co-operation on a regional basis on the lines that art classes and art schools are allocated for the several areas with a central art college for the region as a whole. The response to our proposal has been encouraging, and I hope that in the next 12 months we shall make considerable progress in achieving our aim. Last year and during the present year we have approved a number of important new proposals for building or re-housing technical colleges; for instance, new buildings at Coventry and Dudley, a new technical college in Middlesex and an extension of a technical institution at Willesden. There is also an important proposal for a new technical college at Barking, to serve not only the needs of the older urban districts but of the new towns springing up on the north bank of the Thames, including important industrial concerns like the Ford motor works at Dagenham.
I have kept the Committee at great length, but before I finish I would like to say a word or two about constructive policy for the future. I regard the corner-stone of elementary education as the policy of reorganisation of our schools on the lines of the Hadow report. It is the Board's intention to press on with this policy as rapidly as financial circumstances permit. I believe that the reorganisation of elementary schools on the lines of the Hadow report to be the greatest educational advance that this or any other country has made in the last 20 years. What I say is not based on theory, but on experience and practice, as far as we can obtain it.
All the reports from the Board's intelligence service, the inspectors, confirm the great advantages gained by children in reorganised schools. Every type of child, whether clever or backward, is found to benefit in the senior schools. Clever children do not mark time; the school is no longer a waiting-room in which they kick their heels until the longed-for day of release. They are grouped in appropriate age groups and are taken forward to more advanced work. But perhaps most profit is gained by the children who find it somewhat difficult to learn from books. They are children who have plenty of intelligence but not much literary skill. They belong to what we
might call the non-academic class of child. These children in the reorganised schools are sorted out into their appropriate groups or streams, and it is much more feasible to offer them a range of work selected and simplified according to their needs, and to distribute them so that they can get greater individual attention than they could get when they formed, as they did in unreorganised schools, a small section in a class much of whose work was beyond their understanding and outside their interest. The so-called dull and backward children need no longer remain at the bottom of the school in the lower classes. They are gradually taken up in their appropriate group and are given a curriculum suitable to them. They get instruction which is really interesting to them. The traditional subjects are often uncongenial to them, and if instruction is to have a vital interest it must be and is made more realistic.
Practical instruction is a feature of the reorganised school and every type of child gets the advantage of it. The result is apparent in the first-rate work which is being produced, and undoubtedly it will have a very great influence on the craftsmanship of this country in the future. It is not only in the senior schools that the good effect of reorganisation is felt. It has an influence on the junior and infant schools. They can now be treated as separate institutions, and the separation from the seniors makes the younger children a more distinct and therefore an easier educational problem for their teachers. The younger children are no longer hampered by the presence of dull and backward scholars who are out of place in a curriculum and environment planned for their juniors. In their last year in the junior school the children gain at an early age valuable lessons in responsibility and leadership, and when they take their place in the senior school they get the salutary lesson of having to find their proper place again at the bottom of the school.
The practical work in the junior schools is most encounaging. There is nothing forced about it. The children like it, though I did hear of one small boy who was heard to remark the other day "Oh, 'ow I 'ate my 'obby." But he was the exception that proves the rule. There
again the conditions of teaching are very much better under the new regime. I know that the hon. Member for Aberavon (Mr. Cove) will bear me out when I say that there is a vast difference between teaching a class of the same age group and teaching a class composed of children of four or five different age groups. After all, in the matter of reorganisation we have to remember that the primary condition of success is bound to be the teaching. I regard the headmastership of any of these senior schools as one of the most important jobs, if not the most important job, in the whole of the teaching profession.
Let me refer to another point. According to our inspectors, when it is possible to make a comparison between adjacent areas similar in general economic and social conditions, but differing in the progress made with reorganisation, it is found that there is an unmistakable superiority in the intellectual attainments of children in the reorganised areas over the children who are still in unreorganised schools. A striking example of the success of reorganisation is provided by the Union of Lancashire and Cheshire Institutes, the body concerned with technical education in those and neighbouring counties. According to their recent report they have been led to reorganise their preliminary courses in order to make them more suited to the better prepared students now coming forward from the senior schools and to bring them into closer connection with the senior technical courses.
At the same time there is always the question of finance to be considered, and progress towards our goal must be slower than many of us would like. The policy of reorganisation was introduced by my Noble Friend the Member for Hastings (Lord E. Percy), and it is a policy which is being carried out by my Noble Friend the President of the Board. In some ways perhaps one might liken him to Moses on the Mountain of Nebo. He sees the Promised Land before him, but, unlike Moses, I hope we shall be able to enter it with him.
In the secondary schools we are trying to introduce greater freedom in developing a variety of courses and to enable the schools to be less subject to what has been called the tyranny of matriculation, so that we may avoid a curriculum which
might otherwise become too academic. Changes of this kind are not easy to bring about because there are always certain vested interests, but I believe that a sounder public opinion is being built up on the subject. Nowhere can public opinion assert itself more effectively than amongst the employers of labour. In that connection we are trying to get, and are gradually succeeding in getting, a much closer liaison between industry and commerce on the one hand, and the educational system on the other. We are trying to induce employers to interest themselves far more than hitherto in the educational system and to familiarise themselves with what we are doing and in the products we are producing, in the hope that they will recruit their staffs a good deal more scientifically and carefully than they have done in the past. We also hope that the sympathy of employers will be stimulated so that they will allow their young employés far greater facilities for part-time education in the day-time, instead of leaving those employés to get their further education in evening classes after a long day in the shop or factory.
I have tried to portray, and I hope that I have succeeded in showing the Board as being active in well doing. I have given, I am afraid at great length, a progress report, but, even so, I have had to omit a great many topics upon which I should like to have touched— for instance, selection of children at 11 plus for admission to secondary schools, the problem of the first school certificates, the influence of the cinema and the wireless in teaching, and many other matters. In some ways my survey has had to resemble the annual report of the chairman of a public company to his shareholders, but with this difference, that they look for cash profits and dividends, whereas most of us will have departed long before any estimate can be formed of the real success of our measures. At the same time, we are confident that the best investment this nation can make lies in the education and training of its children. But it is a long-term investment, and progress cannot, in the nature of things, be sensational or spectacular; indeed, for many reasons it had better not be, lest we had to retrace our steps or build houses of cards only to kuock them down. I said in the Estimates Debate last year that I hoped I
would show the Committee that we had kept intact the fabric of education. This year I have tried to show the Committee, and I hope that they will gather from what I have said, that we have done a great deal more, and that we have enhanced and enlarged it.

Mr. MORGAN JONES: May I ask one question? I appreciate that the hon. Gentleman could not touch upon certain subjects, but I would like information upon one subject. I understand that the Board have recently arrived at some arrangement whereby they make an additional grant to denominational colleges in future. Will the hon. Gentleman tell us whether that is so, and, if so, what is the amount of the financial commitment, and whether there is a change in the proportion of students not attached to any denomination who may enter denominational colleges?

Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: I should like an opportunity to verify the information which, I think, I have on that subject. The position of the denominational colleges, as a result of the restrictions we had to make in the number of entrants into training colleges, was different from that of the local authorities, and the denominational colleges were definitely very considerable losers by our restriction. In order to get them out of this difficulty—I am speaking now from memory—we have, for this year only, given them a grant to help them out. If I gave the hon. Member an exact figure I should be wrong, and I will give it to him when I reply.

4.4 p.m.

Mr. COVE: I beg to move, to reduce the Vote by £100.
Last year, on a similar occasion to this, it was my pleasant duty to congratulate the Parliamentary Secretary on his most excellent statement in regard to the Estimates. This afternoon I can unreservedly reiterate my congratulations. I have listened for 10 or 11 years to Estimates being expounded from that Box, and I have felt that no Minister of the Crown has been so successful in expounding his Estimates as the present Parliamentary Secretary has been. But part of his cleverness is that he has taken us away from realities. He has painted a beautiful picture, and we have been extremely interested in his literary
allusions, and have entered into his classic jokes, but the tendency has been to obscure the reality of the policy the Government are pursuing, which reality is unadulterated reaction in the field of education. I am not asking the Committee this afternoon to take ray word for that statement. It might be contended that I was making an ex parte statement, that I was biased because I happen to speak from the Labour benches, or because I happen to have been, for my sins, at one time a teacher in an elementary school. I am not this afternoon going to ask the Committee to accept my word, but, if the Committee will allow me, I am going to ask them to accept the word of a body whose opinion, I believe, cannot be disputed—an impartial body, a body which has no political affiliation, a body which has wider administrative experience of education than any other body in this country. I refer to the body which is known as the Association of Education Committees, a body which, in its national organisation, represents the local education authorities up and down this country.
The hon. Gentleman gave a beautiful picture of progress, though he was very careful to emphasise that he had no story of sensational progress to put before the Committee, but the Association, which is impartial, non-political, with experience, as I have said before, of educational administration unmatched, says the complete opposite of almost everything the Parliamentary Secretary has said this afternoon. A short while ago—in December—an official deputation of that body approached the President of the Board of Education, the Parliamentary Secretary and the permanent officials of the board, and brought to the notice of the board the circular which was issued during the crisis of 1931. The hon. Member for Walsall (Mr. Leckie) was among the deputation, and he will be able to recall it. This body went before the Minister and reminded him that the Circular governing the administration of education in this country, imposing drastic economies on account of the crisis in 1931 in every phase of educational activity, was still in operation, and was still the policy of His Majesty's Government. An hon. Member opposite is pleased, but it does not bear out the
statement of the Parliamentary Secretary this afternoon. Let us see what that Circular says, because I want to get the voice of the education authorities to this House, it I may. The spokesman of the deputation said:
I address myself first to the resolution adopted by the Annual General Meeting of the Association in June last.
What was that resolution?
That the time has now arrived when the embargo of the Board of Education on the provision and improvement of school buildings should be lifted.
Then the spokesman went on to say:
It has been suggested that no embargo in fact exists.
That is what the Parliamentary Secretary has suggested this afternoon. The Committee has been led to believe that really there is no embargo, that the situation is being met in a very reasonable and progressive manner, although not in a sensationally progressive manner— still, the needs of the time are being met. But what does this spokesman of the education committees say—not a Labour politician, but a person representing the collective opinion of the most experienced men in this country in education administration, and men, moreover, who not only have education at heart, but who represent the ratepayers. This spokesman, representing this body of opinion, says:
We are unable to accept that view.
There you have, in a statement of the spokesman of the education authorities, a fiat denial, a complete refutation of the assertion that no embargo has existed. They go into further details, and I hope that I shall be allowed to mention them, but first let me read the paragraph of the circular issued during the crisis:
As regards new developments (including the provision of additional teachers) the financial provision to be made by Parliament will, it is hoped, suffice to cover grants in respect of

(a) new projects to which the authorities are already contractually committed, but which have not yet fully matured;
(b) any essential new need, e.g., of new housing estates;
(c) urgent repairs and treatment of the worst "black list" schools.

Paragraph 12 of the same memorandum-lays it down that any new developments in any sphere of education with which local authorities are anxious to proceed will be
judged on their merits, and in particular in the light of the probable extent of the annual additional charges involved. Generally speaking, however, it will only be possible to consider additional annual charges in such cases in so far as they are covered by countervailing economies.
Before there can be expenditure on one branch of the service, there must be countervailing economies on another branch of the service. I want categorically to ask the Parliamentary Secretary who, I hope, will reply further to this Debate: Has the circular issued during the crisis in September, 1931, imposing restrictions upon developments in the education service, been scrapped? There can be no reversal of policy without that circular being scrapped, and, as a matter of fact, the fine words of the Parliamentary. Secretary butter no parsnips in this respect. He may come down here and give us a very excellent speech, but the reality would be the scrapping of the economy circular. Can he get up and say definitely that there is no embargo? Can he get up and say definitely that the policy of the crisis has gone, that with the revival of trade—and he found great pleasure in it this afternoon—with the returning prosperity, there has also been a return of real progress in the educational world? Can he say that definitely and categorically? Let me go further. I am relying on this document this afternoon, and I want to read it because it is authoritative. Says the spokesman of the authorities:
I have made careful inquiry as to the extent to which the judgment of local authorities of the needs of their areas for new schools is being set aside, and I am startled by the volume of the response.
Here is a local authority charged by Parliament with responsibility for meeting the educational needs of an area. They go to the Board and say, "We have a number of children for whom we are not at present able to provide and we want this or that new development." They ask for permission to proceed and we are told by the spokesman of the education authority that he has been startled by the number of occasions on which such requests have been turned down by the Board. Is not that more important for us to realise, than what was contained in the speech of the Parliamentary Secretary this afternoon?
Examining the replies very carefully"—
the statement continues—
to find some thread of principle running through the policy of the Board, I find that in general all new proposals for the amelioration of the conditions of very young children, of ailing children, of defective children and, in general, all proposals for the extension of the provision of the playing fields are rejected by the Board. Approval is not generally given to the provision of nursery schools, of open-air schools, of playing fields or of schools for defective children.
The whole category of educational activities—stultified and starved by the present Administration! That list, as a matter of fact, practically covers the whole of the activities in the educational world. I do not want to exaggerate, but I say frankly that I did not realise the extent of the stark reaction that is being pursued by the Board until I studied the statements by the education authorities. I do not think that any hon. Member here would say that those statements are not true. Is there any hon. Member who will say that a body of responsible persons, representing Conservatives and Liberals I should imagine, and people who have no political colour at all, per-sons with the greatest experience in educational administration—that this competent body is making false statements? It is clear from the evidence submitted by them that the embargo on educational activities still exists, that finance dominates the policy of the Board, and that, in the educational realm, the crisis of 1931 is still upon the children of this country, who are being denied that educational opportunity which any civilised country ought to give them. The statement goes on to contrast the policy of the Board of Education with that of the Ministry of Health. I am not going into that question in detail, but I will read the final statement. It was addressed to the President of the Board himself, and it was as follows:
We ask your Lordship to consider that this policy is not in accord with its immediately past policies: that hurt is being done in the denial of the educational needs of the children of the country; that the children to whom you are by your policy denying the benefits of the schemes of reorganisation enjoyed by others are losing those benefits for all time"—
Then follows a tremendously strong statement, and I hope the Committee will realise how strong a statement it is for these people to make. I have been
criticised by many of them for making too strong statements and for taking up an attitude which they regarded as extreme. They have criticised me in their journal more than once, but this is what they say themselves in continuation of the statement which I have already quoted;
—that by your policy you are denying health and physical betterment to large numbers of children sorely in need.
Could there be a stronger or more serious statement than that? The Parliamentary Secretary treated sympathetically—in words—the question of the feeding and health of children. Here is a representative of the education authorities saying that you are denying health and physical betterment to large numbers of children who are sorely in need. They proceed:
We beg that you will take immediate and vigorous steps for the revivification of a department whose charge and concern should be primarily for the children who cannot speak for themselves.
At the end of the report I find this:
Lord Irwin replied to the deputation. The discussion on the above statement was, by agreement, regarded as confidential.
I have not anything to complain of in that and it may have been regarded as confidential there but the House of Commons has a right to know what was the policy enunciated, even at that discussion and the country has a right to know. It is wrong that the Minister's reply should be regarded as confidential. It is a matter of high public policy. It involves millions of children. It involves the whole educational outlook and future physical well-being of those children. The House of Commons has no right to allow that to pass as confidential in the board room at Whitehall. It is a matter of the greatest public importance and if we cannot have a reply from the Parliamentary Secretary to-day I am going to suggest to my hon. and right hon. Friends on the Front Opposition Bench, that the position in the field of education is serious enough for us to have these Estimates brought up again for discussion. I have discovered that the short time at our disposal to-day is not sufficient to deal with such a serious situation. [HON. MEMBERS: "Hear, hear!"] It is not my fault that this Debate has to end at half-past seven o'clock and, as I have been asked to speak on behalf of my party, I am going to try to put forward their point of view as strongly as I can. I ask the Parliamentary
Secretary to give us definite facts —to tell us categorically that the policy enunciated during the crisis is no longer the policy of the Government, that the policy of the starvation of the mental and physical needs of the children is no longer the policy of the Government. It has been suggested that there is no embargo such as I have indicated. I quote this from the official organ of the education authorities dated 2nd February:
A borough authority a few days ago submitted a scheme for the building of a school peculiarly necessary to meet the needs of the area. A curt—not discourteous—communication was received that the Board were unable even to consider it.
The local education authorities ask: "Is this embargo?" They point out that:
the general policy of the Board stated explicitly in Circular 1431 is that no new schools shall be built in any area other than a newly developed housing area unless the cost can be met out of countervailing economies.
They ask is that an embargo on development or not? Of course it is an embargo on development. The Parliamentary Secretary this afternoon prided himself on the wiping out of black-listed schools. Last year in these Debates I read some descriptions of schools which I was ashamed to read. Any hon. Member who cares to do so can look them up and I can supply many other eases of filthy and insanitary buildings. Teachers are supposed to teach the children in the classroom cleanliness and hygiene when the physical conditions in the school are filthy in the extreme. Many of these blacklisted schools still exist throughout the country. The Parliamentary Secretary prided himself on the fact that his Department was tackling the problem. Let us see what the education authorities say about that. It is not what I say. It does not matter what I say but it does matter what the education authorities say.

Viscountess ASTOR: It depends on how long you take.

Mr. COVE: The Noble Lady has to keep quiet for once. I am determined on that this afternoon. The education authorities' official organ says:
Even the black-list schools are to be preserved for the benefit of mankind. Proposals for the rehabilitation or reconstruction of the very schools which have come under the Board's condemnation have been disallowed.
The Board has condemned schools and that is a noble action in itself. No doubt the present Administration prides itself on the fact that it has condemned schools but the amazing thing is that we find on the authority of the education authorities' journal that even where they have condemned schools, permission to reconstruct has not been given. The local authorities say they have been prevented from dealing with black-list schools. They add:
The Minister of Health has initiated, developed and is carrying on a campaign for the abolition of slum housing. The policy of the Board of Education, for which Mr. Ramsbotham answers to the House of Commons, has for its immediate object the perpetuation of slum schools which his predecessors in office have condemned.
They ask "why" and they go on to say:
Is the truth that while Mr. Ramsbotham asseverates and reasseverates his love of education and what it connotes, that this love is not shared by the Government he so faithfully serves?
I am not going through all these figures but an examination of the Memorandum on these Estimates is enough to disprove the statements made from that Box this afternoon. Perhaps I may be allowed to say a passing word of praise for the Labour Government against whom I voted so often. Anybody who takes up this Memorandum and examines it can see when the Labour Government was in office. One can see merely by the statistics when Sir Charles Trevelyan was President of the Board of Education with my hon. Friend the Member for Caerphilly (Mr. Morgan Jones) as Parliamentary Secretary. I refer hon. Members to page 18. In 1930 proposals representing in round figures £13,000,000 were approved by the board. In 1931 the figure was £7,000,000; in 1932 it was £4,000,000 and in 1933, £2,500,000—drop after drop. Take the medical service. In 1930 it was £349,000; in 1931, £160,000; in 1932, £59,000.

Mr. MICHAEL BEAUMONT: Hear, hear!

Mr. COVE: That cheers the heart of the hon. Member opposite. Diehards' hearts always beat high over economies on children. We go from £59,000 in 1932 down to £29,000 in 1933. During the whole period of the present Government, economy, lack of expenditure in every sphere of the education service, is shown. The hon. Gentleman talked about large
classes. I hope he has read the speech of the President of this Association to which I have referred. He will find there that you still have 400,000 children in classes of 50 and more. I believe I am not far wrong in saying that, though I am speaking from memory. At any rate, large classes still exist, and the Minister did not tell us this afternoon that as far as anyone can find out—and I do not think he will deny this—for the first time for ever so long there is going to be an increase in the number of children in large classes.
Now let me turn to the physical side, and here I want to make a statement about which I want to be rather careful. Many of my hon. Friends and many people in the country are beginning not to put their full faith in some of the reports that have been issued in various parts of this country with regard to the malnutrition of children. I will not go further than this, but there is a feeling growing up, and many people are suspicious, that the examinations and reports are not as objective as they might be, that more opinion and feeling enter into them of a partisan character than is good. Everybody who is connected with the distressed areas knows that children are ill-fed and ill-nourished. What is happening in the Rhondda Valley?

Viscountess ASTOR: I will tell the hon. Member what is happening there.

Mr. COVE: All last winter the teachers, with other citizens, were engaged, week after week, in organising concerts and sales of work—with twopenny and threepenny tickets—spoiling the full advantage that the children ought to get, as a matter of fact, from the education service, in order to provide boots for the children to go to school. Everybody knows, or ought to know by now, what malnutrition is, though I have tried to find out what it is technically, and I find that the doctors themselves do not know. They do not accept any test universally. They do not agree. They do not know what it is, technically. It used to be thought that if a lad or a girl was growing big and fat, that was all right, but you can feed children up like you can fatten pigs, without the resiliency there. It all depends on the type of food you give. You can fatten without strengthening. Go down to Eton or Harrow, go to Winchester, go to Rugby, go to Marlborough, and see the
physique there, on their playing fields. Then let us bring children up from my constituency in the Avon valley, children of the unemployed, or let us bring the children of the Rhondda Valley up, and place them side by side on the playing fields of Eton and Harrow and compare their physique. That will show the amount of malnutrition that is taking place in the great distressed and derelict areas of this country. I am prepared to accept that test. I was looking through Paten's list of schools, with beautiful pictures of the playing fields. The fee for Harrow or for Eton is, what?

Viscountess ASTOR: Oh!

Mr. COVE: Keep quiet. I am going to have my say, and I will thank the Noble Lady to keep quiet. Look at those lists of fees—£200 a year, £180 a year, £150 a year, with pluses. To-day you are spending round about £12 per head to educate a child in an elementary school, and I say that the process of economy pursued by this Government is a class policy of the most rabid description. You cannot have equality of opportunity in a capitalist world of any kind, but the nearest approach you can get to it is by giving some equality of opportunity within your educational system. The educational system has been a greater contributor towards equality of opportunity than any other social service in this country. The Parliamentary Secretary is content with the reports that have been sent him about the physical condition of these children, I beg him this afternoon, in this House, not to be content with those reports. Some investigation must take place which will reassure this House and the conscience of this country that these children are not being ill-fed. We are not satisfied as it is now.
Such an investigation took place in Newcastle the other day, with regard to children under five, it is true, but it was the sort of investigation that I suggest. An investigation was undertaken into the physical condition of poor children and of the children of the better-to-do, and what did they find? Nearly half the number of children in the poorer class were found to be below the standard height, compared with only 5 per cent. of the better class children. In weight, more than half of the children in the poorer class were below the standard, as
against 13 per cent. of the better class children. Only 2 per cent. of the poorer children were above the standard height, as compared with 25 per cent. of the better class children; and in weight only 11 per cent. of the poorer children were above the standard, compared with 48 per cent. of the better class children. With regard to anaemia, only 20 per cent. of the poorer children passed a test satisfactorily, and 23 per cent. were found to be definitely anaemic. I understand that that is not due to malnutrition either. According to the standard set, there was no anaemia among the better class children. A study of the histories of the children showed that 49 of the 125 poorer children had suffered from acute or chronic chest trouble, compared with only 5 of the 124 better class children. That calls for nursery schools.

Viscountess ASTOR: Hear, hear!

Mr. COVE: Not nursery schools out of the pocket of the Noble Lady. We freely admit that she has been interested in this question, and she wants to tell us all about it now, but I submit that the provision of nursery schools ought not to depend on the pocket of the Noble Lady.

Viscountess ASTOR: Hear, hear!

Mr. COVE: It ought to depend on the pocket of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, and it is now clearly established —I think this investigation establishes it—that from the ages from 1 to 5 there is tremendous need for much better attention being paid to the physical needs and general well-being of children. One further point—and I am sure the Noble Lady will be pleased to hear that. I want to ask the Minister, What is the policy of the Board with regard to the raising of the school age by by-law? I had always assumed—and most innocent people like myself had assumed also— that if a local education authority wanted to raise the school age, made an investigation, and came with a request to the Board, the Board would say that the responsible local education authority had come to this conclusion and that therefore the request should be granted. But what do I find from an answer given by the Minister? He says:
Proposals for such by-laws have been submitted to the Board during the last two years by the local education authorities for Burnley and Huddersfield, but the Board were unable to approve them.
That is unsensational progress. He goes on:
The question has also been discussed, either formally or informally, between the Board and the local education authorities for Cheltenham, Colne, Lowestoft, and Northumberland, and has been deferred for further consideration.
That is unsensational progress.
It is understood that the Gloucester City Local Education Authority are also considering the question."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 24th April, 1934; cols. 1547–8, Vol. 288.]
Has the Board of Education come to a definite policy on this subject? Am I not right in inferring from that answer that the Board has decided that there shall be no raising of the school age by bylaw? Why the hesitancy? Why the turning down in the cases I have mentioned? Why the deferring of the question? One would have imagined, if the Board were of this mind, that where a local education authority had decided to raise the school age, that would have been quickly approved; and the only inference that we can draw—unless there is a denial from the Front Beach, which I very much hope will be forthcoming—is that the Board has now determined that the age shall not be raised by by-law. The policy of the Government in this respect, as I said in the discussions on the Unemployment Bill, is that they have now decided that there is to be no raising of the school age and that the policy of the Government is to be found, as the Minister has said, in the Unemployment Bill.
I say again that that is class legislation within the field of education, throwing thousands and thousands of these lads into industry, out of work, and then junior instruction centres. There never was an occasion when it would have been better for the children or for this nation that the school-leaving age should be raised. We shall have in the next few years hundred of thousands of children more in the field of industry than we have had in the past few years. Unemployment is going to be rampant; now is the time therefore when we should raise the school age. From the benches opposite the idea has been put abroad that money spent on education is waste, that it is spending and not saving. There is no higher form of saving than the spending of money on the development of the
bodies and minds of the children of this country. It is capital development. We give too materialistic an interpretation of saving. What is saving under modern capitalist society? It is generally regarded as building up factories, adding to capital equipment for further production, bank balances and capital accumulations. Spending on these children is capital accumulation of the finest kind in which the country can invest, and the Government are rendering a great disservice to the children and are not meeting the needs of the modern situation if they still hark back to the policy enunciated in the crisis of 1931. I ask the House to agree with us and to see to it that the physical condition of the children is rectified and that they have a chance of the full education that they deserve.

4.49 p.m.

Sir PERCY HARRIS: We have just listened to an eloquent and moving speech from the hon. Member for Aberavon (Mr. Cove). Everybody who knows him knows with what deep conviction he speaks and how much he feels about this vital problem. I would like to add my congratulations to the Parliamentary Secretary. I envy him his masterly handling of difficult figures and complex problems which he showed in his rapid survey of the whole problem of the education of the children. I do not think that any Minister is able to get so many words in so short a period as the hon. Gentleman. He seemed to be able to rush through the problem without an error or a mistake and without losing the thread of his argument. Whatever we may think of his opinion, it shows that he has his heart in his work, and that he thinks all day of his responsibility in is difficult jub.
I wish that we had the annual report of the Board, which is usually a very remarkable document. It loses some of its value because it comes out rather late in the day, and particularly this year because it will come after the discussion of the Education Estimates. I pay a tribute to the value of the report when I say that it is a handicap to be without the valuable facts and figures which it contains. It may be that we are taking an earlier opportunity than usual to discuss the Estimates. It is also unfortunate that we should have only half
a day for this discussion. That is quite inadequate to the size of the problem and the number of hon. Members who wish to take part. I hope that both sections of the Opposition will co-operate to get the Government to give another half-day so that other Members may have an opportunity of expressing their views, because education is entitled to a full day's Debate once a year.
We are not only without the annual report of the Board, but without the annual report of the Chief Medical Officer. After the remarks of the hon. Member for Aberavon, the Minister will agree that it is most important that the annual statement of the Medical Officer should be available when we come to our annual survey of education, because his work is an essential part of education in these days. In the last Debate we did not have the advantage of the report for 1932, which did not come out until November, 1933. It is always one of the most remarkable documents published by His Majesty's Stationery Office. I believe that when the history of public health in this country comes to be written. Sir George Newman will be shown to have contributed more to it than any one medical man or public officer in the country. His reports are comprehensive, fair, incisive, well written and have real literary merit, which is usually missing from most public documents. They are so clear that for the meanest intelligence it is difficult to avoid his point. I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary steeps himself in the recommendations and the criticisms contained in that report.
I wish specially to call attention to page 11 of the 1932 Report, because it contains a complete answer to the criticisms in the Ray Report about extravagance in the administration of public health by education authorities. Replying to the suggestion that because expenditure in some areas was so much less than in others there must necessarily be extravagance, Sir George Newman says:
Because an authority takes an unduly narrow view and makes inadequate arrangements, thus securing a low unit cost, it cannot be seriously suggested that other authorities should come down to the same ineffectual level. On the other hand, other factors sometimes operate in the production of a low unit cost such as the provision of treatment facilities by charitable
organisations at little or no cost to the authority. During the past year, the financial aspects of the service were meticulously examined in 14 representative areas by officers of the board, and their reports indicate that, with small exception, a reduction of expenditure could he effected only by a definite decrease of efficiency.
Finally one word should be said upon the second question, 'would an increased expenditure producing even better results than at present be a true national economy?' The answer from a medical (point of view must clearly be in the affirmative, though not necessarily in the affirmative for all branches of the school medical service. The dental work, for instance, is an example. There can be no doubt that a substantial increase in expenditure would not only result in sorely-needed extension of that service, at present little more than initiated in most educational areas, but it would be definitely economical in the sense of ensuring the ultimate value of the preliminary inspection and treatment of the teeth. To make a child's teeth sound at eight years of age and neglect them thereafter is not in the long run economical, but rather extravagant; to provide dental treatment effectually in area A and neglect to do so in area B is partial, inequitable and nationally ineffective; to fail to follow up the business in later school life or in adolescence is short-sighted.
Are the Government in this matter shortsighted? Are they seeing that area B is brought up to the standard of area A? Are they effectively discharging their duty and meeting the criticism of their own medical officer and adviser at the Board? I rather hesitate to trespass on what my Noble Friend desires to say, but I think that Sir George Newman's report on nursery schools is most pertinent. There is no better friend of nursery schools and no one who in and out of season has more advised the Board of Education in the interests of real economy, which is the well-being of the State, to undertake a progressive policy in the organisation of nursery schools. I wonder how much the Board's own medical officer is listened to. He points out that there are at present 58 nursery schools recognised by the board, and says:
Owing to financial stringency the recognition of new nursery schools has been temporarily suspended, but the last school to receive recognition affords an excellent example of adaptation of existing premises to meet the needs of a small area.
He states that there is a growing con-census of opinion that these particular schools are valuable, and adds:
The children coming from a nursery school into the infant department at five
years of age are physically better and are more amenable to ordinary discipline than the child who has remained in a poor home. Some 'emergency nursery centres' have been established in certain slum areas at Middlesbrough and elsewhere.
There are two pages of the report giving facts and statements showing the advisability of pressing on without delay with nursery schools, but I will not read them; I will hand them to my Noble Friend who may desire to quote them. We understand that the bar of the national emergency is now removed. I think, therefore, that we have a right to command the Parliamentary Secretary, as representing the board, to outline the Board's policy towards nursery schools. The hon. Gentleman's very long speech seemed to cover everything, but he forgot even to mention one thing. Perhaps he meant to put it in his peroration. He forgot to mention the two words "nursery schools." In the light of the advice of his own accredited official, he is bound to give a lead to the country without waiting for local authorities to take action. He should stimulate them to make this most economical investment of public money in order to prevent evils arising in the life of the child because of early neglect in providing these most useful and well-proved institutions.

On the question of elementary education, the hon. Gentleman was very complacent and satisfied. I am afraid that the best that can be said for the Board is that there has been two years of masterly inactivity. It has been a close time for circulars, at any rate. We have been spared them during these years, and that has been some consolation. Those monthly bombs which came from the Board and disturbed local authorities have ceased to be fired. We have to be thankful for small mercies. The fact is that the clock has been set so far back in the past year that it was not possible to put the hands any further back without bringing the machinery pretty well to a standstill. I understood from the peroration of the Minister that he agrees in principle that the time for inertia is past and the time for activity has arrived. The severe financial stringency which faced the country has passed, and the Government may take whatever credit is due to them for that fact. Now they can go to the local authorities and say: "There is a good time coming. Owing
to our sound financial policy there is money in the coffers. The country is no longer bankrupt. Therefore, go straight ahead with the good work of education and we will sympathetically consider your proposals."

There is another reason, and perhaps a more practical reason, for a forward policy. There are new facts which the Board cannot ignore. The Minister passed over them lightly, indeed, he hardly referred to them. There is the fact that a very large number of children are pouring out of the schools and entering the labour market to compete for the available jobs and to be, I am afraid, contributory factors adding to the number of the unemployed. Compared with last year there will be this year an extra 200,000 children above the normal leaving the schools and entering industry. According to the estimates of the Board, there will be, roughly, during the next four years 800,000 children above the average leaving the schools and entering industry. The usual number is two and a quarter millions.

That is a big problem. It may be that the conditions of industry will so improve and that there will be such a revival of trade—I hope there will be; I do not want to be a pessimist—that we shall be able to deal with the problem. Even if things are normal and do not become worse we shall have a very difficult problem before us to absorb the big army of two and a quarter million children entering industry when it is supplemented by an extra 800,000 children above the normal. The Board cannot shut its eyes to that problem. To his credit the Minister of Labour is facing up to it. He has realised the seriousness of the position and, rightly or wrongly, has made provision for it in the Unemployment Bill. These persons, however, are children and they are the Board's care. The Board is primarily responsible and they cannot shift the responsibility on to another Department. To the credit of the Minister of Labour he is prepared to shoulder the responsibility that the Board of Education has tried to avoid.

There is another side to the picture, and that is why I would emphasise the necessity for a new alignment of policy on the part of the Board. While these children are pouring into the labour market they are pouring out of the
schools. There is a steady decline of the school population. From a statement made by the Minister, in answer to a question which I put last November, there were last year 5,640,000 children in the schools. By 1937 it is estimated that the number will have been reduced to 5,140,000 children. There will, therefore, be a falling off of 500,000 children in the schools. The Government must have a policy in regard to what is to be done with those vacant places. They cannot shirk it. The local authorities are entitled to a lead in the matter.

I have a great opinion of the noble Lord who presides over the Board of Education. He is one of the great figures in the State. No one admires him more than I do. He fills a great post with ability and capacity. I was pleased when he took over the position of Minister of Education, but he cannot sit in Olympian silence and feel that he can get out of responsibility because he happens to be in another place. I wish he was here. The responsibility is with the Board. The country demands a lead and the local education authorities want to know how they are to deal with this new problem. The Board is a partner. It finds part of the money and has a right to say: "Are we to have smaller classes? Are we to maintain the same number of teachers for a smaller army of children in the schools, or, alternatively, are we to deal with them in another way?"

The newly-elected London authority, to its credit, is very much conscious of the problem. They want the school-leaving age to be raised, and they want the Board of Education to deal with that question. It would be out of order for me to deal with that matter now. It is a very controversial subject. There are, however, bye-law making powers. The Act of 1921 anticipated a situation of this kind. Certain authorities have already exercised those powers. What is the Government's attitude to the authorities who desire to do that? A London conference has been summoned, and various local authorities in London have agreed to attend. They are going to discuss frankly and freely the alternative policy of raising the school age by bye-laws. What is the attitude of the Government to be? In greater London there is a very difficult and complex problem. It would be a fatal blunder to raise the school age in one
part of London and not to raise it in another part, to raise it, say, in Croydon and Hendon and not to raise it inside the county or, alternatively, to raise it inside the county and to fail to do so outside. The Board exists and is paid for the purpose of directing the policy of the country. If it is going to sit as a passenger, silent, indifferent, apathetic, without a policy, we might as well sweep the Board away and economise in that direction, and leave this work to the Treasury or some other financial authority. The Board is the Department of the Government which deals with education and it has a direct responsibility to deal with this problem.

I agree with the Minister as to the immense progress that has been made in organisation. In London 88 per cent. of the schools have been reorganised and by next year 77 per cent. of the children will be in reorganised schools. That is a great triumph. In the Hadow Report, to which the Minister rightly paid a great tribute —he recognises that report as his guide, philosopher and friend; he is steeped in its philosophy—it is stated that there should be a four years' course to be effective. Will he accept the whole scheme as outlined so that when the reorganisation is complete children over 11 years of age shall be required, in order to make the new education effective, to stay at school for four years? He ought to give the country a lead. Let him say: "We are against raising the school age by by-law and we are going to stop any schemes of that sort," or let him say: "We will sympathetically receive any suggestions on those lines."

I understand that West Riding and Lancashire authorities will meet next week. The Board have turned down Huddersfield. I do not think it is wise to take small areas. If you are to raise the school age by by-law it must be done by large areas, so that you will not have children coming from one area and taking the jobs in another area. That is what has brought about the breakdown of the county council's experiment.

Sir ALFRED LAW: Have not the suggested by-laws to be submitted to a poll of the parents of the children, in accordance with the Education Act of 1921?

Sir P. HARRIS: I do not think so. The only authority to which they have to be
referred is the Board of Education. There is nothing that requires that there shall be a ballot of the parents of the children concerned. If the organisation is to be effective, there must be, first, a four years' course. That point is made clear by the Hadow Report. In the second place, they insist upon the necessity of proper buildings. If the schools are to be suitable and to be effective for their purpose and if there is to be a new atmosphere, the buildings must come up to something near the standard required for secondary schools. The hon. Member for Aberavon was right on this point. During the last 12 months the Board has, time after time, turned down proposals for new buildings or for reconstruction. I am told that in Lancashire and Yorkshire time after time proposals for rebuilding schools have been turned down by the Board, although that is part of the essential provision for carrying out reorganisation.
There is also the question of equipment to be considered. The Hadow Report constantly dwells upon the necessity of broadening the syllabus of education if it is to become acceptable to the children in the schools. Obviously, a world run by black-coated people would soon come to an end. Trade would stop, fields would go unploughed, and machinery would come to a standstill. If the extension of the school age is to be acceptable to the parents, the children must be brought more into contact with real life. There must be greater variety in the curriculum and the opportunities for manual and mechanical work should be brought up to the standard required in technical schools. But there again, unfortunately, the Board are at fault. No encouragement is given to local education authorities to bring these new schools up to the standard required in the report. The report suggested that there should be a parallel division of senior schools into, on the one hand, grammar schools to provide literary education, and, on the other hand, modern schools with modem equipment, modern machinery and all that is required to give a really effective practical education such as would enable children to enter a factory or workshop equipped as are children who enter the literary professions or commerce or trade. Last year I referred to a remarkable report
by four inspectors sent out by the Board of Education to study Continental methods. I think I can claim some credit for the journey of those four inspectors, because I have constantly pressed on previous Boards the necessity of studying Continental methods. Their report is most emphatic on the necessity of the development of technical education in this country if our young people are to be efficient for their work and our industry is to hold its own with industry in Continental countries. On page 47 they say:
To an English observer the equipment of Continental technical schools appears to be lavish. … This applies to the schools in Belgium, and especially to the trade schools. Even the smallest are provided with some machine tools, and the largest are as fully equipped with machines and precision instruments as a modern industrial firm.
Then they make four practical proposals. First, they suggest an increase in the number of junior technical schools. The Parliamentary Secretary was apparently conscious of the importance of that problem, because he referred to it, but progress last year was comparatively slow. Secondly, they suggest a considerable increase in the number of junior vocational schools. Thirdly, they speak of the inadvisability of leaving the training to evening classes, and say how important it is to remedy a state of affairs under which the bulk of our children who receive such training acquire it after a hard day's work in factory or workshop, when they are too tired to take advantage of it. They insist on the necessity of proper opportunities for attending day continuation schools. Finally, and this is a practical point in reference to the new system of senior schools, they urge the proper equipment of senior elementary schools, saying:
In view of the fact that the great majority of skilled workers in our industries need intelligence, alertness and flexibility, rather than specialised skill, the manual instruction work undertaken in the senior elementary schools should be broadened in scope; it should include work with a considerable variety of materials, simple machinery should gradually be installed and team work should be encouraged
That all means money, find also a complete reorganisation of the character of these senior schools. I know from personal experience how those schools are handicapped by insufficiency of
materials, of equipment and of machines. I suggest to the Board that if they really mean business, if they really want to be worthy of their responsibility, they should outline a practical policy for making this reorganisation of schools not merely a figurative reorganisation but a real reorganisation, giving us a system of education suited to the needs of the country and comprising, before long, a four years' course. The Board exists, and I want the Board to function, and not any longer to be afraid of its shadow. The Board of Admiralty has a policy; the War Office has a policy. The Ministry of Labour has outlined a policy in its great Bill which, however we may disagree with it, at any rate was an attempt to deal with one of our economic problems. The Board of Trade has its policy. What is the policy of the Board of Education? If the Board is to be effective, if our education is to be on the right lines, the co-ordination of which the hon. Gentleman has spoken will not be enough. A real constructive policy is wanted, so that our education in the 20th century may be up to the standard and meet the needs and requirements of a 20th century population.

5.21 p.m.

Mr. GODFREY WILSON: I should like, in the first place, to join with those who have congratulated the Parliamentary Secretary on the admirable way in which he has presented these Estimates, but, unlike the speakers who have preceded me, I shall not go on to disagree with everything he has said. The two previous speakers have referred to elementary education, and I want to say something concerning higher education. I wish to bring before the Committee's attention the Regulations laid down by the Board of Education in relation to State scholarships in universities in England and Wales. Perhaps I may be allowed briefly to give some account of these State scholarships, showing how long they have been in existence and the object for which they were instituted. It was in 1920 that a grant was first made from the Treasury for State scholarships, in order to encourage the flow of pupils from grant-aided schools to the universities and, generally, to encourage individuals, who could not afford a university
education, to take it. The scholarships are restricted in value; the maximum payment for tuition fees is £50 a year, and the maintenance grant cannot exceed £80. The tenure of the scholarships is three years, though they may be extended to four.
The Regulations laid down by the Board are many in number, but there are only three to which I wish to refer. The first is the educational test. Every candidate for one of these scholarships must have passed one of the examinations known as the higher certificate examinations conducted by the various universities in England and Wales. There are half-a-dozen or more of such examinations. The next test is the financial test, or, in other words, and to use an expression more familiar in this House, the means test. Every parent or guardian of a boy or girl who wishes to enter for one of these scholarships has to make a statutory declaration showing what his means are and stating how much he himself can afford to pay towards the boy's or girl's education at the university, and the scholarship, if awarded, varies in value in accordance with that declaration. The maximum value, as I have said, is £50 for fees and £80 for maintenance, but the actual value of the scholarship may be less if the parent is shown to be capable of providing something towards the cost.
The third regulation to which I wish to draw attention, and to which I and many others in the House take particular exception, is that boys and girls, in order to be eligible for these State scholarships, must be pupils in full-time attendance at a secondary school recognised by the Board of Education for purposes of grant, or, in other words, grant-aided schools. They are schools which the Exchequer already subsidises in a very substantial manner for the education of boys and girls. I suppose everybody in the House will admit that the first two regulations, that dealing with the educational qualification and that imposing a means test, are reasonable—I think they will be accepted even by the Opposition who sit below the Gangway but as regards the third regulation I maintain that discrimination between grant-aided schools and any other schools in the country is entirely unjustified. These State scholarships are paid for by the taxpayer, and the field should be
open, and there should be no favour. The opportunity should be open to all who fulfil the first two conditions, the test of educational qualifications and the test of means. Any boy or girl in any school in the country who has satisfied those two tests should be allowed a perfectly free and open chance of getting one of those State scholarships. [An HON. MEMBER: "NO."] I hear an hon. Member of the Opposition say "No." I know why. He wants to force parents to send their children into grant-aided schools, and to do away with the whole tradition of our educational system. This is not a question of one law for the rich and another for the poor; the regulations as they are at present are one law for poor X and another law for poor y, and that is quite unjust.
As a general rule, I am prepared to agree that there are probably more boys and girls in the grant-aided schools who are in financial need than there are in the other schools. The Committee should not think that I am speaking from the point of view of the great public schools such as Eton, Harrow and Winchester, where there are very complete and adequate endowments to help pupils, but I am speaking of schools where there are no such facilities. They are not grant-aided, and are struggling schools. They are excellent in their way, and I could mention a number of them. It is not fair actually to specify any schools that I have in mind, but they are among the so-called public schools. It is difficult to define a public school, but in those I have in mind the endowments are extremely slender. There may be excellent boys and girls there who have only a one-in-20 or one-in-30 chance of getting an exhibition —comparatively, a negligible chance. Those schools are not already a charge upon the State in respect of grant, and the boys and girls from them satisfy precisely the same educational tests as are demanded for State scholarships they also satisfy the test of being able to show financial need; yet the children are debarred from State scholarships. If I could prove that there was only one boy or girl in this country who was excluded from the benefit of education in a university on account of the regulations, that would prove the necessity for a change in the regulations.
But it is not a case of one; it is a case of very many.
The crisis of 1931 affected a very large number of parents who would have been able, looking forward under normal conditions, to afford to send their boy or girl to a university without requiring a State scholarship, but that crisis changed the circumstances of many parents in such a way that they are not able to face the expenditure required, and yet they are debarred an equal opportunity under these regulations. All I ask is equality of opportunity. The hon. Member for Aberavon (Mr. Cove) used that phrase in his speech. I have heard of parents who are faced with this alternative, whose children at the moment are at a school which is not grant-aided, that they cannot afford to send their children to a university and they have to ask themselves whether they should take their boy or girl away from the schools where they are being educated in order to make the children eligible for a State scholarship. The Board of Education points with pride to the academic successes which State scholars have succeeded in attaining. I think I am right in saying, speaking from memory, that 89 per cent., or perhaps a little greater, have succeeded in getting first or second-class in honour examinations in a university. That leaves a very ominous 10 per cent. who are only getting third class. After making allowance for failure for illness, or some other circumstance which does not depend upon the intellectual powers of the scholar or upon whether he has been lazy, there is still a large percentage of failures, which ought not to be the case. There are 20 or 25 of the 300 scholars who are elected now who fail and who ought never to be encouraged to go to a university. They have been chosen while perhaps 20 or 25 who were much better capable of benefiting from a university education than they have not been allowed to compete.
The point that I want to impress upon hon. Members is that we are doing an injustice to boys or girls who have to earn their living on their academic record. It is a real unkindness to send boys and girls of that kind to the university and to let them come out with a third class. They
might have been much better employing their time learning something else than competing in the higher educational circles with those who can get first or second class. I do not know what percentage of scholars get first class, or second class, the latter is not of very great value in the educational world. I have been challenged to produce figures comparable with those to which the Board point sometimes in regard to scholarships. I have taken the trouble to get the records of my own college for a period of 10 years. I do not think my college differs very widely from others, but in those 10 years we had 131 scholars, and they took 217 honour examinations. Perhaps it is unnecessary for me to say that one may take more than one honour examination in the process of getting a degree. Out of those 217, there were 135 first-class. That is a very good record indeed; 62 per cent. of our scholars get first-class. I do not know how that compares with the State scholars of the Board of Education. The number in the second-class was 69, that is to say, 32 per cent., and only 13 were third-class. That is almost exactly 6 per cent. The percentage of third-class does not differ very widely from the percentage of third-class of State scholars, but the percentage of first-classes is better. A third-class may not be quite such an injury or be so disastrous to the ordinary boy or girl who comes up from a public school and who may not be dependent upon making a living afterwards in the educational world, as it is to one who comes up and, having get a State scholarship, only obtains a third-class.
There is no discrimination between one school and another in any other form of assistance—and there are many of them. Local education authorities are able to make grants for suitable candidates to go to universities, and there are leaving exhibitions from schools, and scholarships at Oxford and Cambridge. The whole thing is open and free to all, and depends upon educational qualifications and, in nearly every case, upon need. It is open to everyone, and there is a fair field and no favour. Why should not the State scholarships be equally free? What would hon. Gentlemen opposite say if the colleges of Oxford and
Cambridge were to say, "We shall not allow people to be eligible for scholarships who come from grant-aided schools"? We could not stand against the uproar for five minutes. Everyone will agree that the way in which the scholarships at the Oxford and Cambridge Colleges are awarded is fair and free from favour.

Mr. COVE: What would you say if the endowments were taken away from the public schools?

Mr. WILSON: That goes a little outside, but I can answer the point in this way, the endowments of the public schools benefit and give help to boys and girls who need it. There is a needs test in every scholarship. I am not speaking for the great public schools which are heavily endowed, but for the small schools which have only very small endowments. Unfair discrimination exists between those schools and the grant-aided schools. The only attempt which has been made to justify the discrimination is that, if the field were widened, and boys from any school, subject to the fundamental conditions which I have mentioned, were eligible for a State scholarship, it would mean a large reduction in a number of State scholarships available for boys and girls in the grant-aided schools, or it would mean an increase in the national expenditure. I would not for one moment support anything which would now increase the Vote required for this purpose.
Let us think for a moment; either I am correct in my statement that there is a considerable number of boys and girls who, owing to these regulations, are prevented from getting to the university and getting the benefit of the higher education, or the number is so small as not to affect the number of scholarships which would normally be given to boys and girls in grant-aided schools. If the number be large, so much the greater is the injustice against which I complain; if the number be small, so much the less will the number be of scholarships available for boys and girls in grant-aided schools be affected. I do not want to press the Board too much at this stage, but I would like to make this practical suggestion, and I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will be able to accept it when
he replies. Let the Board test the actual facts over a year. Let the Board announce that they are prepared to consider applications from boys and girls in schools which are not grant-aided. Let the parents of the boys and girls send particulars of their children having passed the examination test and a statutory declaration as to their means, precisely as is required under the regulations now. Let the Board then say, having examined those statements: "We will let you have a chance with the others." That would show what the numbers are likely to be, and it would show what effect it would have on the number of scholarships available for the grant-aided schools. If, as I believe would be the case, it showed that there are a large number of deserving boys and girls who ought to have as great a consideration as those in grant-aided schools, let the Board say, "We will let you compete on the same terms as others."
I am speaking for all universities, and the view which I am expressing has received the support of every University representative in this House except one. I have been in touch with other universities, apart from Oxford and Cambridge, and I have talked over the matter with their vice-chancellors. I have not met with a single vice-chancellor who does not agree with the point of view that I am putting. I have spoken with school masters at some of the larger schools, and I find that it is almost unanimously agreed that the regulations should be amended.

5.44 p.m.

Dr. G. MORRISON: I ask the indulgence of the Committee on venturing to raise my voice in this Chamber for the first time. I promise to be brief, and I can make that promise the more confidently as some of the subjects on which I should most have liked to speak would be excluded by the Rules of the House. I should like, first of all, to congratulate the Parliamentary Secretary on the very interesting and able statement which he made. He interested me from the very beginning when he spoke of the reorganisation of the schools which has been in progress. He is justly proud of what has been done, and we must all rejoice that so much has been done in the time; but the hon. Gentleman knows as well as the rest of us that, so long as the
senior school course remains shorter than the four years which the Hadow Committee considered essential, so long must it remain a truncated and incomplete thing. I hope that before long we shall be able to congratulate the hon. Gentleman on its proper completion.
I regret the delay in raising the school-leaving age, on general grounds. It was always, in my opinion, a sound policy; now it is an urgent need. I regret that delay also on the special ground that, until England does something in the matter, no money is forthcoming to enable Scotland to do anything. As to the question of allowing authorities to raise the age by by-law, no one can object to the Board's exercising its discretion if it finds that the local conditions are not suitable, but one would like to feel that no difficulties are being put in the way. Without going into details, one may say in general that difficulties of accommodation and difficulties of staffing are now much less than they would have been three years ago. One was glad to hear, during the Debates on the Unemployment Bill, that the interim solution, as I may call it. afforded by the junior instruction centres is not to be a bar to the raising of the age at some future date, one hopes before long. In the meantime, it is up to all of us who are concerned to make that second-best alternative as good as it can be made. Now, when the expected great and rapid expansion of those junior instruction centres is about to take place —in their first year some eight or 10 times as many young people will be accommodated in them as before—one hopes that a good standard of staffing, equipment and environment generally will be set up and maintained. It is of the utmost importance for many reasons that the prestige of these institutions should be high, and in that connection there is one point that I should like to mention. I understand that some education authorities are willing to lend the services of their medical officers for these centres, and I was glad to hear the Parliamentary Secretary say that the Board is not likely to be niggardly in the matter, but will look with an indulgent eye on any such schemes. I mean, of course, medical service for those who are not insured under the National Health Insurance scheme.
The hon. Member for South-West Bethnal Green (Sir P. Harris) has referred to the question of nursery schools. One of the most important discoveries made in the course of the medical inspection of schools has been that many of the defects which are discovered in the course of the medical inspection of schools are defects which could very easily have been remedied, and with much better results as regards after-life, if they had been found during the pre-school years. One hopes that the Board will give a lead and begin a forward policy in connection with this and some other matters. Reference has been made to recruitment for industry, and one welcomes the increase in the number of consultations between home and school on the one hand, and between school and industry and commerce on the other. There is one matter to which I should like to refer in that connection. Speaking as an old headmaster, I am afraid that in giving vocational guidance our methods of what I may call vocational testing have been somewhat rough and ready. I contrast them with something that I was able to see a year ago in an elementary school in Rome. That school, which was of the ordinary size, had attached to it a completely equipped psychological laboratory, intended to serve that school and three or four others. In charge of it were two ladies, trained psychologists, one with a medical degree, and it was interesting to see the large number of delicate, expensive and elaborate machines for all kinds of testing for response to stimuli and so on. While this was mainly for the benefit of those who were about to leave school, it was being done throughout the school course, and very accurate records were being kept. I would ask the hon. Gentleman to consider the possibility of doing something in that direction a little more scientific than what we have been doing in the past.
There is only one other matter that I should like to mention. As regards the size of classes, the latest figures that I have been able to get show that between 1931 and 1932 the number of classes with 50 pupils or over fell from 8,571 to 7,986. I think the hon. Gentleman mentioned a later figure, but I did not catch what it was. The numbers, however, are still appallingly large, and it must be
common knowledge that the modern enlightened methods, which make much use of individual work and practical work, pre-suppose smaller classes. I would express the hope that there may be further reduction, and that the process will be speeded up.

5.54 p.m.

Mr. WEST: I am sure the Committee would wish me to congratulate the hon. Member for the Scottish Universities (Dr. Morrison) on the thoughtful, interesting and instructive maiden speech which he has delivered. As I understand that there is still quite a number of would-be speakers, and the time at our disposal is but short, I do not intend to detain the Committee for long. It seems to be a custom, when these Estimates are introduced each year, for the Minister to mention the fact that practically two-thirds of our expenditure on education goes in teachers' salaries. I would not complain about that except that I think that it gives a wrong impression to the country generally. People seem to have the idea that teachers are extravagantly paid, but to-day there are still many thousands of women teachers who, even after the restoration of half the cut, are receiving less than £3 a week; there are thousands of men teachers 30 years of age, with eight or nine years' service, who are receiving less than £5 a week; and even in London, which is perhaps the highest paid area in Great Britain, the average salary for men teachers is very little above £5, and the maximum is still under £7 a week. When one considers that most teachers do not begin to earn until they are at least 21 years of age, and sometimes older, I think that very few Members of the House would consider that the salaries present paid to teachers are at all extravagant. In fact, they are in my opinion still a grossly underpaid class of public servants.
Another point which the Minister stressed was that he had not received much evidence of malnutrition in this country. He seemed to think that one had to go to distressed areas to find such evidence, and that even there it was lacking. I do not think he need go so far as that. If he would go only a mile or two from this House, to the Royal Borough of Kensington, he would get plenty of evidence if he sought for it at
all. He would find, in the northern division of the borough, an infantile mortality of 120 per 1,000, and, in one ward, of 140, or twice that of Poplar. He would find a disease rate in children double the disease rate in the southern part of the borough, and he would find, if he would investigate in conjunction with the medical officer of health, an abnormal number of cases of malnutrition. I suggest that, if the Minister would take a trip to Kensington, he would discover that evidence which at present he finds lacking in his journeys up and down the country.
We are frequently told that the country is weathering the storm, that we are out of the crisis, and we see evidence in the financial journals of the increased stability and wealth of the country. If that were really true, this ought to be a year, not only of rejoicing from the benches opposite, but of pronounced development from an educational point of view. It ought to be a year of abnormal expenditure on education. But that has not been the case. The Minister himself admits that in the last two years there have been economies amounting to nearly £7,000,000 a year. With regard to buildings, he seemed to think that what I would call the slum schools were to be found only in non-provided areas or in rural areas, but again he need not go so far to find slum schools—he can find them in London. Having taught in many parts of London, I believe it would be fair to say that practically one-quarter of the schools of London could well be pulled down and re-built in any decent five-year educational plan in this country. I know of schools within a mile of this Chamber with playgrounds for 40O children of which the area is less than that occupied by this Chamber. We talk about cleanliness in the class-rooms, but I know of schools where you will find 200 boys with two towels to keep themselves clean in recreation-time and lunch-time, though cleanliness is next to godliness.
As regards books, I do not pretend that the equipment from the point of view of books in many of our schools is what it was in pre-war days. Hon. Members on this side will recollect the reading lessons when there was one book for a class for a year, and when, if you told a boy to go on reading and he
happened to have lost the place, he could still go on, because he knew the book by heart. Things are not so bad now, but everyone knows that the provision of reading books in our schools in this country is generally woefully deficient. Again, in a large number of schools in London the lighting is still by gas, and, while the first rows in the class-room are warmed by the fire, the children at the back are frozen. The Minister admits that there are still many hundreds of classes in our schools with more than 60 pupils, and many thousands with more than 50. In London I have had the pleasure of teaching classes with only 30 or 35 pupils, and it was never my experience that, with a class of 30 boys, I had too few in the class. In fact, I think it is true to say that no teacher, however clever and conscientious he may be, can teach in any reasonable fashion a class of more than 45 or 50 children. Modern methods and modern teachers stress the importance of individual tuition, but when you have a lesson of 40 minutes for a class of 60 children, by the time you have gone round and said "Good morning" and "How are you?" the time is up. It is impossible and stupid to think that there can be. any real educational efficiency so long as thousands of our classes exist with 50 or more boys or girls in them. Indeed, in my opinion there is every reason for saying that, instead of a decrease of £7,000,000 in the Education Estimates for the last two years, this Government and this country ought to have been spending £10,000,000 more. It would have been a far greater thing to boast about this year if we could have said that we were spending £10,000,000 more on education and £10,000,000 less on military Estimates than the reverse, as has been the case in the last two years.
I often wonder why Conservatives as a whole seem to be opposed to educational development, though I know there are individual exceptions. Is it because they have realised through statistics that poorer children, who have had little opportunity, come out very well in examinations in comparison with others? I wonder if it is because they fear that in competition the working-class child will be at least as good if he has the opportunity. If that is not the reason, what is it? I wonder if it is because the average Conservative realises that in the
last 60 years, as we have spent more on education, as we have had better schools, and perhaps better masters and equipment, they have seen that the whole tendency has been towards a more democratic outlook. I wonder if some of them think, as the old Tories used to think, that more education means the downfall of Tory ideas and traditions. If it is so, they ought to put on the other side of the scale the obvious truth that, as we have spent more on education, we have produced, from their point of view, better workers, better thinking workers, more productive workers, and from the sheer mercenary point of view, from the business and profit-making point of view, the better educated our workers are the better for the economic standing of the country. Even from the lowest point of view that is true.
I do not feel at all pessimistic when I look back on the progress of the country in the last 60 years generally. Not being a pessimist, I can see very well that during that period there has been, from almost every point of view, very great progress. There have been less drinking, less crime and less distress. Although there are many factors contributing to that improvement, I believe that increased and better education is the biggest single factor. If that be true, it would be sound common sense and sound economy not to decrease but to go on increasing educational expenditure, making it more efficient, and giving the poorest children an equal opportunity with the richest. It would pay the State from every point of view, and, in my judgment, it would be the best investment in which the country could indulge.

6.3 p.m.

Captain SPENCER: I should like to add my modest congratulations to the Minister on his speech. I welcome more than anything else the definition of the picture that he painted. We hear a great deal of the pictures painted by educationists. My great complaint against them usually is that they are very indistinct and hazy. That, at any rate, cannot be said of the Minister's speech. He has had two very difficult years in which to function in the Department, and it would be ungenerous on our part not to recognise that, in spite of the difficulties, in spite of the crisis through which
the country has passed, the educational structure as a whole has survived pretty well. I can never agree with those who seem to think that, the more money you spend on education, the more efficient it is bound to be. On the other hand, I believe that very often, in a time of crisis such as we have passed through, the Department is inclined to think that by petty economies it can do something really worth while, and the great danger that they have been up against in the last two years is in falling to the temptation of making small economies which might do damage to the educational structure far out of proportion to the amount of cash that they save. The hon. Member for Aberavon (Mr. Cove) trailed his coat, principally at the Noble Lady the Member for the Sutton Division of Plymouth (Viscountess Astor) and my hon. Friend in front of me, and I will not tread on it, but there are one or two points to which I should like to refer in connection with secondary education. I cannot go into any great detail on the question of pensions. The Minister touched on it, and I hope that he is giving the matter very careful attention. I would just remind him that, at any rate at present, the teachers are suffering in perpetuity a cut in respect of pensions which was only imposed to meet a national emergency, and I will leave it at that.
I should like to say a word upon the separation of the matriculation and school certificate examinations. I welcome the decision that has been made to bring the school certificate examination more into alignment with the requirements of the present position. The whole tendency in the past, and the influence of the examination, has been to stereotype the curriculum, to eradicate individuality and to bring all the schools to one dead and dull level. In my opinion, that is a very bad thing in the secondary schools. Indeed one of the reasons which make me enthusiastic on the question of education—here I part company with hon. Members in front of me—is that I believe if you followed their policy to its logical conclusion you would deprive our secondary school system of its most valuable feature, that is, the variety that has always existed throughout those schools. As Pope said in another connection;
What shocks one part will edify the rest;
Nor with one system can they all be blest.
Of nothing is that more true than of the secondary schools. Anything that the Board can do, through the alteration of this examination or in any other way, to preserve the variety and individuality of the schools instead of stamping it out, would be welcomed by every true friend of education. Another fault of the examination is that it has led to the desire to accumulate facts rather than knowledge. It was Huxley who once, speaking of his science students, said:
These students study to pass and not to know, and outraged science takes her revenge. They do pass, and they do not know.
That is one of the curses that have been put upon our schools as a result of the demands of the matriculation examination. Then my hon. Friend will have two great difficulties. First of all, he will have to contend with a very large body of employers who demand a matriculation certificate as a passport to employment. I had a case brought to my notice two years ago of a young fellow, whom I knew, who applied for a post in a firm in one of our large cities. He told them he was a Bachelor of Science with honours from Manchester University, and he was granted an Interview. The gentleman who interviewed him said, "What have you done? What can you show me?" He replied, "I am a Bachelor of Science." The man said, "I know that, but have you passed matriculation?" That is the attitude of a surprisingly large number of employers, who seem to think that this certificate is a wonderful thing, and unless a person is the proud possessor of it, he is not worthy of being offered a post.
Perhaps an even greater obstacle will be the parents. You come up there against a quite natural family pride and a certain amount of jealousy where you get boys going to the same school, particularly in industrial areas, and a certain amount of social prestige is lent to the mother of William, who passed his matriculation and who will look down her nose at the mother of Thomas, who has not been so fortunate. There is, no doubt, also a reform needed in the character of the examination itself, which
should be based more upon the actual curriculum of the schools and less upon the requirements of universities than it is at present. There is too much tendency to make the examination approximate to the intermediate or preliminary examination in universities, to save the tutors and professors a certain amount of work.
I think that this school certificate examination should be, in its essence, a test of what the boy or girl has done at school, and the certificate a badge of proficiency and of attainment. Secondly, I should like to see more oral and more practical work in examinations. English, a subject in which I am particularly interested, is very much neglected. It tends to be more and more a test of the candidate's memory—whether he can reproduce from the text book, or from the skilfully compiled notes of his teacher, just those things which the examiner is likely to ask him. I think there is room for more oral work in connection with English, and, of course, foreign languages generally. There should be more room for practical work. At present what is called group IV in the school certificate examination, which embraces these practical subjects, is an outcast in many cases and schools only resort to it as a last resort for what they look upon as their border-line cases of pupils who come very near the margin of mental deficiency.
Then there is required a fairer assessment as between subject and subject. If you are to have these passports, which the child is to carry with him for the rest of his life and be asked for by employers, you should not have the anomalies which arise at present. I have two examples which are very striking. One pupil who took this examination passed up to the standard of good in two subjects, credit in three, passed in two, and failed in one, and get 1,099 marks. He failed although he had reached a pass in no fewer than seven subjects out of eight. Another pupil in the same school get no "good," one "credit," five "satisfactories" and two "fails." with 281 fewer marks, and passed. That is obviously an anomalous state of affairs which ought to be remedied.
The Minister congratulated himself upon the way he got away with Circular 1421, [...] I cannot allow him to get away quite so easily as that.
Circular 1421 as put into operation was a totally different thing from Circular 1421 as it was laid before the House. There was all that blessed elasticity brought into play, and all that concession made which we know that Wales received in greater abundance than any part of the Kingdom. The fears that we had when the Circular was first issued were very reasonable and well-founded fears. It is in the administration of that circular that those fears have been removed, and as a result, no doubt, to some extent of representations that were made on the subject by local authorities. I agree with the hon. Baronet the Member for South-West Bethnal Green (Sir P. Harris) who said in this Chamber not very long ago that it would be an excellent thing if we could have a close season for circulars, and then we could have some time to think about them before they were issued, and, having had some time to think about them, we should not waste time afterwards in explaining them away and whittling them down.
There is another example of a circular which at the time caused considerable perturbation, and reasonably so. There, again, we had the usual explanations that the circular did not mean what it seemed to mean, but that it had an inner meaning which would be expounded to the authorities concerned. There was talk in that circular about extravagant staffs. It appeared, at any rate on the surface, to recommend larger classes, and whatever may have been the case in the primary schools, there is no doubt that in the secondary schools there has been an increase in the size of Glasses. Whereas in 1930 those possessing more than 30 pupils amounted to something like 3,600, in 1932 they had gone up to 4,800, so that Circular 1428, at any rate, coincided with the increase in the size of classes. Of those at the present time above the limit, some are science classes with more than 35 pupils, and I would like to appeal to the Minister on that point. In science it is not merely bad for teacher and pupil, and not merely inefficient, but positively dangerous to co-am, as I have seen, 37 children into a laboratory constructed to hold two dozen children, and to put a teacher there with responsibility for all that
might happen. It is putting too much strain on the teacher. It is impossible for him to do justice to his pupils and to the subject of which he is in charge, and at the same time to look, as he is bound to look, after the safety and well-being of those children in such a confined space. Under Circular 1428 there are, no doubt, authorities which are afraid to do what they ought to do, namely, to increase their staffs in order to make proper provision for the children in those swollen classes.
There is one other thing to which I should like to refer in regard to Circular 1428. It is suggested in connectiin with the circular that in order to economise staffing, pupils at the top end of the school should be transferred to some other school where a suitable course might be provided. That would be a very bad thing and would have a very bad influence on the spriit of the school. A number of these schools are old schools and have a tradition. Those which have not an old tradition have been building up a tradition for the last 20 years. There is an esprit de corps about the school. Boys are proud, though some might not think it, after leaving some of those secondary schools, of the fact that they are old boys of those schols, and it is a thing we ought to foster and encourage. If at the age of 16, when he is about to become a leader in his school, a boy is to be taken away and put in some other strange institution, it will do a great deal of damage to something which is far more valuable than the few pounds which may be saved in that connection. These are comparatively minor points, and I end as I began by saying that I think that, on the whole, our educational system has been in good hands, and has suffered very little considering the very difficult times through which the nation has been passing.

6.21 p.m.

Mr. ERNEST EVANS: The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Education in the course of his speech to-day, compared himself to the chairman of a public company delivering his annual address. That analogy had occurred to me before he himself mentioned it. In the course of his speech he used phrases which shareholders have now become quite accustomed to hear. He emphasised the necessity for what he called conserving
our reserves, and warned his hearers against expecting any sensational or spectacular results. His warning was delivered at the proper time, because we certainly have not had either sensational or spectacular results. At the same time, I join with othe rspeakers in congratulating my hon. Friend upon the very charming and interesting way in which he presented his annual report to the Committee. Above everything else, I welcomed the great change in the tone and temper of his speech to-day from what occurred on the last occasion, when it seemed to me he was more concerned with defending his Estimates against those who criticised the expenditure of public money upon our educational services. To-day he was more concerned with defending (his Department in respect of justifying what they had been doing in the course of the last year. I do not want to say anything which will detract from the value which he has claimed for the services of the Board of Education during the past year.
I welcome very much the figures he gave showing the great improvement in regard to the buildings of elementary and secondary schools. He must not rest content with what he has done. There is still a great deal of room for improvement in regard to the buildings of our schools, particularly in rural areas. I emphasise the point because it has relation to what he said about the physical condition of the children. He spoke with justifiable pride of the provision which is being made for the feeding of school children, but, as far as rural areas are concerned, it is possible that the benefit the children gain by the provision of meals may be more than counterbalanced by deficiencies in two directions—the one the deficiency of the school itself, and the other the matter of transport. When I come up from Wales to London I have to pass through an area which includes about six elementary schools, and I cannot help observing in the early hours of the morning, and at all times of the year, the children who have to walk several miles in all sorts of weather in order to get to school. It may very well be that, by reason of the insanitary condition of the buildings and the dangers which they incur as a result of the early morning walk in all weathers, whatever may be done in the matter of feeding the
children may be more than counterbalanced by the defects arising from those two considerations, I emphasise and press upon the Minister the necessity of securing an improvement in the sanitary condition of schools in rural areas. The Minister of Health has recently sought and obtained powers from Parliament with a view to meeting the dangers which may arise from the drought, and I would ask the Board of Education whether they cannot get into touch with the Ministry of Health—because they do not seem to be spending the £1,000,000 very rapidly; I doubt whether they have spent any of it so far, as I have not heard of a single grant being made—to see whether there is a chance of getting hold of part of that money with a view to improving the water arrangements in schools in rural areas.
I also welcome what the Parliamentary Secretary said about the reduction in the number of large classes, and, in view of one statement which he made, I would emphasise that the importance of the reduction in the size of classes is not to be measured by the prospect of giving employment to a larger number of teachers. We are concerned in advocating the reduction in the size of classes not from that point of view, but from that of advantage to the children by giving them the education which they need and which will be useful to them in the future. I also welcome what he said in regard to technical education, where there is also room for further improvement. I was reminded of a remark made by the late King of the Belgians in a foreword to a pamphlet issued by the Minister of Education in Belgium. He said:
Technical education is one of the essential elemeents of the economic life of the country: its value contributes to the progress of our industry. One cannot conceive a nation compelled to export in order to live failing to seek every means of lowering the net cost of its products. Experience shows that this cost depends chiefly on improved methods. But to give its full yield, modern technique demands qualified workmanship which will be trained in schools capable of introducing students to the most modern processes.
That matter applies equally to this country, and therefore the Board should go further in the encouragement of technical education. At the same time, one must enter a caveat that technical education should not be substituted for the
general education provided by the general educational system of the country.
There are one or two criticisms I should like to make in regard to the educational structure of the country. I approach the subject from two ends. One is from the point of view of early childhood, emphasising the importance of developing the whole idea of nursery schools and their efficiency, and the other is from the end of encouraging every local authority which by means of by-law seeks to raise the school age. I was a little disappointed at the reply which the hon. Gentleman gave yesterday in answer to a question as to the attitude of the Board of Education to certain local authorities which were anxious to raise the school age. It did not seem to incorporate the spirit which we expect from the hon. Gentleman, and which we are entitled to expect from the Board of Education. It was rather a discouragement. I believe that the general opinion of the Committee is that it is up to the Board of Education to give every encouragement to every local authority which is anxious by means of by-law to raise the school age where that is possible.
I should like to ask a question with regard to Wales. I have heard the figures showing the grants made by the Government to education in Wales covering several years. I will take only three years. In 1932 the grants to all branches of education in Wales amounted to £3,909,323, and in 1933 it had dropped to £3,688,423. I can understand that there are various causes for that, including the reduction in salaries of teachers. In 1934 the grant went down still further to £3,605,656. I shall be obliged if the hon Gentleman, either now or on some future occasion, can give some explanation of the very considerable decrease in the amount of grants made to Wales. I, in common with many who are interested in educational matters in Wales, regret very much that the Secretary of the Welsh Department, Sir Percy Watkins, has left the Department. We appreciate the great energy and enthusiasm which he displayed in respect of all educational matters in Wales; at the same time, I think that we can congratulate the Board very heartily on the choice of a successor
in a man whose character and personality, I am sure, will enable the Board to view Welsh educational matters with great favour and energy. I still feel that there is a lack of co-ordination with regard to our whole educational system. We find the most recent illustration of that fact in the Unemployment Insurance Act, in the fact that the responsibility for juvenile training centres is entrusted to the Ministry of Labour. I believe that to be a mistake, and it is only illustrative of the common failing in regard to the educational system of this country. The President of the Board of Education ought to be President of a board of all education in England and Wales. He is not. Many educational activities are entrusted to other Ministers, which means inefficiency. Just as the whole of the finances of the country are in the charge of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, so in regard to education you should coordinate your system so that the Board of Education is the responsible authority. Only in that way will you promote the highest efficiency.

6.31 p.m.

Viscountess ASTOR: The hon. Member for North Hammersmith (Mr. West) asked why it was that Tories were always against education. If he will make inquiries he will find that some of the finest educationists have been Tories. In fact, good educationists are never politicians, and the trouble with the Labour party is that they have made education a political question. Really they are not any keener about it than any other party. No party is keen about education. Education is not a very popular subject; if it were, we should have had a better system long ago. I resent very much the endeavour to make it a party question; it is much too important for that. It is far above any party question. The Trades Union Congress used to say that the party stood for education, but they put it so far down on the agenda that they could never discuss it. There has been very little vision on this subject for the last 15 years. Women used to be classed with criminals, lunatics and paupers, and they have had no say whatever in the education of their children until quite recently. In spite of this lack of vision, we have probably the best educational system in the world. It is not yet good enough for some of us, and it will not be developed in the right direction
unless there are some people who are constantly pressing its importance on the attention of the Government.
I have heard hon. Members on the Front Bench make the most beautiful speeches about an uneducated democracy carrying a torch in their hands, but I have never heard one of them speak with a torch in his own hands about education. I really believe that the Parliamentary Secretary would do so if he were a free man, and had his own way. I congratulate him on what he wants to do. It is all very well to criticize the Government, but after all, we alone, among all the countries in the world, have not had to make during the last two years great reductions in our expenditure on education. I (have been appalled at the fact that some of the States in America have had to close down their schools. We have not opened as many new schools as we would like, but, at any rate, there has been no closing down of schools. The time, however, is certainly coming when the Government will have to have a more progressive policy in education and give a lead to local education authorities. I was glad to hear the delightful maiden speech of the hon. Member for the Scottish Universities (Dr. Morrison), because it showed that he is a progressive educationist. Some university Members have not been progressive at all in the matter of education. It is absolutely essential that we should raise the school age. The Noble Lord the right hon. Member for Hastings (Lord E. Percy) is now talking about the necessity of raising the school age. I wish he had seen the necessity for it five years ago, and that the Labour party had seen the necessity for it when they were in office.

Mr. MORGAN JONES: We did.

Viscountess ASTOR: Do not talk nonsense to me. The Labour party put in a perfectly ridiculous little Clause in a Bill which even their own party could not support. I do not want to fight on this subject, but it is monstrous that local authorities which desire to raise the school age should be prevented from doing so when the Government are boasting that we have passed the worst of the financial crisis. On this matter the country is ahead of the Government, and the Parliamentary Secretary would, I think, get a vote from the House for raising the school age if it were put before them.
Then there is the question of large classes, which means a waste of education. There are three causes of wastage in education. There is first the large classes, and then there is the wastage in the new buildings. Some schools seem to have been built for eternity, whereas Miss Margaret McMillan made the discovery that you can get much better schools for a much less expenditure. The third cause of wastage in education is one which is very near and dear to me, that is, the wastage in the case of children whose health is such that they cannot take advantage of the opportunities offered to them. The Parliamentary Secretary says that children should not be prevented by their physical state from getting the full benefit of the education given. I am not much good at figures, but I have some figures here which, I think, he should know. We have 1,750,000 children between the ages of two and five years; 175,000 of these children live in real slums and many more in overcrowded conditions. I used to think that all children benefited from infant welfare centres but apparently only 50 per cent. get the benefit of this infant welfare, that is, children up to two years of age.
It is the children between two and five years of age who should be the special concern of the country. That is a gap in our treatment of young children. Of the children entering our elementary schools at five years of age between 40 and 50 per cent. show signs of rickets, while 27 per cent. are physically impaired; I do not mean mentally deficient. Our school medical service is enormous, and little wonder, because 194 children in every 1,000 between five and 15 years of age required treatment in 1932, and 174 more in every 1,000 required medical observation, while 613 in every 1,000 required dental treatment. These are facts which we must face. We also have to face the fact that there are nearly 58,000 children in special schools for blind, deaf, the tuberculous, epileptic, mentally deficient and crippled children. The chief medical officer of the Board has called attention to the neglect of pre-school children in every report for the last 15 years; he is one of the most efficient medical officers in the world, a man of outstanding ability and vision. I must read to the Committee what he has said. In 1922 he said:
After the first year of life the young child has to bear a heavy burden of environmental neglect, associated with bad housing, poverty and absence of hygienic supervision.
In 1923—
There can he no doubt at all that the effective health supervision of the children between two and five is a public health and educational problem of great importance and urgency.
In 1925—
One significant fact in medical inspection is the serious degree of physical defect in the children on their first admission to school. I place this in the forefront of the medical problems of the elementary school.
In 1926—
The school medical service is called upon to deal with a yearly recurring burden of disease coming into the schools. It is not a defect here and there, which can be put right, and that is the end of it. It all too often is a degenerative process.
In 1928:
At present the pre-school child gets very little chance at all, and that is the plain reason why in these precious neglected years the seeds of disease are sown.
In 1929:
We shall never be in a position to deal satisfactorily with our school medical proplems until we improve the physical condition of the children between infancy and school life.
That has been going on for 15 years. We have done very well and made splendid progress in infant welfare work, but from two to five years of age children from overcrowded areas have been neglected and are going to be neglected, although we know the remedies. In 1908 the Consultative Committee issued a report dealing with the advantage of nursery schools, and in 1933 it reported again, and strongly advocated their extension. As far back as 1918 the Board empowered the establishment of recognised nursery schools. In 1931 we were just getting going, and then came the Economy Act. I know of 33 projects which were stopped, and now that we are restoring some of the cuts which were imposed then, I press on the Government that they must restore the cuts which were imposed on nursery schools. They are a vital necessity. We have 5,000 children in the open-air nursery schools while 174,000 children between the ages of two and four are living in slum conditions.
What is the effect on the children of open-sir nursery schools? It has been proved over and over again that children taken from the worst conditions of overcrowding and housing, and from the worst parents, show marked improvement after they have been in the nursery school for a little time. I should like to show hon. Members the picture of a little boy two years of age who was rickety, malformed and listless, a hopeless kind of child. Within one year he was one of the most beautiful boys I have ever seen, alert and strong, and a child of which anyone could be proud. We have proved that children taken from the worst homes by the time they reach five years of age are half an inch taller than an ordinary child and five lbs. heavier than other children. We have also proved that rickets can be eliminated entirely. The figures show that of children who have not been to a nursery school 27 per cent. have rickets, whereas only 7 per cent. of the children who have been to a nursery school suffered from them. Take the case of the Margaret McMillan School at Deptford. Of the 62 children admitted this year 50 per cent. had rickets, not to mention other defects, but of 48 children who left at five years of age two months ago, 93 per cent. had a perfectly clean bill of health. That is extraordinary. Many of the diseases that are developed in later life are caught between the ages of two and five. That has been proved. Then surely it is false economy to economise in any way in the health of the nation and of the children whom we are educating. Children who go from the open air nursery schools are healthy in body and mind and alert. Sir George Newman stated:
In the case of the slum child the nursery school secures a new order of child life. It is almost magical in its rapid growth, showing a triumph over the handicap of home and environment and circumstances.
I could go on quoting for hours. It really is almost magical. Some day the country will wake up and realise what Margeret McMillan was and what she has done. Her beneficent influence has extended to all countries. It belongs to no class, no party and no country. I have taken people who did not believe in nursery schools down to Deptford. I took a leading Member of the Government, who said he could not spare more than half an
hour, but he stayed one and three-quarter hours, and even then I could hardly get him away. At such places one can see what is possible.
Members of the Labour party talk about democracy and equality. I am convinced that the only way in which we shall get equality and really true democracy is by beginning to deal with the children at a younger age than at present. If I had a child carefully nurtured I should not care for it to go into an elementary school at five years of age with other children who may have come from dirty homes, but if you took my child at two years and took at two years also the child from the worst home in England, and you put the two in a nursery school, I would be perfectly willing for my child to go. Apart from health it is creating a new social order. You should see the children. They learn how to co-operate—that blessed word of which we hear so much talk. In overcrowded homes the best mother in the world has an impossible task. From the age of two to five the only place where a child can play is on a floor which is apt to be dirty, or in the street. Naturally the child has a grim time. Only a month ago I saw a child in a Nursery School which had come from a very tragic home. I found it grabbing everything and holding on to its food and its toys. I said to the teacher. "You have a problem there." The teacher replied, "Wait and see." In 10 days' time I saw that little toddler again. She was playing happily with the other children and sharing her toys with the best will in the world.
It is really astonishing what effect the nursery school has. At a very early age it eliminates greed, fear and disease; psychologically it has a wonderful effect. It teaches children companionship and everything that is beautiful in life. The hon. Lady the Member for East Islington (Miss Cazalet) said that when we had the wonderful houses to be provided under the new housing schemes open-air schools would not be necessary. I think she was wrong. Some of these new houses are death traps for children of two to five years. They have no backyards and they are built on the edge of the road. Apart from that, if a woman has to look after many children, even in a good house, those children cannot be looked after properly. With due respect to the hon. Member for
the Scottish Universities (Dr. Morrison), I do not believe we need psychological clinics. It is far better to put children in open-air nursery schools, and to watch them there.
It may be said that all this is talk, and I may be asked what proposal I have to make. I have a very good proposal to make, and I hope the House of Commons will stand by me in pressing it on the Government. It is amazing what you can do with a Government if you push hard enough, particularly when by-elections are going against the Government. I am all for by-elections going against a Government that is large and powerful and strong. It has a very good effect. When I used to press for the raising of the school age my Socialist opponents used to go to the mothers in back streets and say, "Lady Astor is going to take the children away from you." To me education is not a party subject. I believe in an educated democracy. I cannot conceive anything that would make me more bitter than to have a child which I felt could not get an equal chance with other children although it had equal brains. When I talk about education I talk of something about which I feel very strongly.
We know what the Government spend on medical services. At present the sum is £4,500,000. I could give the figure of expenditure on the blind and the tuberculous. If we had a scheme to build open-air nursery schools for 50,000 children it would not cost more than £1,000,000, and, as the Chief Medical Officer has said, a great deal of disease is preventable, and that expenditure would save further expenditure later on. I beg the Government to think of the matter from that point of view. Let us have a really big constructive scheme for open air nursery schools; £1,000,000 is not very much to spend. Think of what we have spent on sugar beet. No better investment than £1,000,000 on nursery schools could be made at the moment. I have come back from devastated areas, and I have seen what open air nursery schools mean. You cannot build an open air nursery school in any area unless the community there is ready for it. There are communities ready for these schools, and there are education authorities ready. But unless the Government will give a grant we shall never get the schools. I beg the Parliamentary
Secretary to be courageous and to save the lives and the health of thousands of children. If I were a child of very poor parents in the slums I would almost rather die in infancy than face life with a deformed and crippled body. I beg the Government to go forward on the road, which will not only be good for the country but may be a paradise for thousands of little children.

6.57 p.m.

Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: I share the regret of hon. Members that these proceedings are to terminate so soon and, that being the case, the Committee will understand that when I try to deal with the points which have been raised I must deal with them in a much more perfunctory way than I would otherwise do. Before I concentrate on the main points, I would answer the hon. Member for Caerphilly (Mr. M. Jones) on a point he raised with regard to voluntary training colleges. The position is that we are making this year a special grant of £20 for each place that they have lost this year, owing to our restrictions. The total sum for the one year, and it is non-recurring, will be about £10,000. We hope that that sum will go some way to relieve the difficulty though we know it will not go the whole way.
The hon. Member for Aberavon (Mr. Cove) spoke at considerable length on the subject of the embargo which the Board of Education is alleged to have placed on new school buildings, and he quoted at considerable length from an article written by the Secretary of the Association of Education Committees. I am sorry that the hon. Member did not rely on his own eloquence and originality which we always enjoy hearing, and that he has borrowed second-hand diatribes from the writer in question. I had seen the article myself, and whether or not it represents the opinions of local education authorities, of whom about 250 are members of the association, I do not know, but I am not prepared to adopt the writer's views as either impartial or accurate. It would have been very much better if the hon. Member, instead of relying on an article, had given me facts that contradicted what I have given to the Committee. I was at considerable pains to state what we have done, the number of schools built, and so on. If I could be given definite instances of
local authorities having complained that they had had proposals turned down, I would be prepared to deal with them, but I cannot deal with a second-hand tirade contained in an education journal.
The hon. Baronet also referred to the circular dealing with capital expenditure. The new building which has taken place is very considerable though within the limit of Circular 1413, and, as the hon. Baronet knows, that circular gives discretion for proposals to be approved on their merits. The whole thing is largely a matter of administration. When I was speaking about capital expenditure I explained to the Committee that the future attitude of the Board will be that where the proposals for necessary capital expenditure are made, they will be sympathetically considered, particularly if they promote reorganisation.

Sir P. HARRIS: Is the veto in Circular 1413 now removed in spirit?

Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: That is a very vague phrase, which the hon. Baronet is rather fond of using. As Circular 1113 stands it is perfectly possible under it to carry out a large measure of reorganisation.

Mr. MACQUISTEN: Circular 13 has been misrepresented by the hon. Baronet up to now.

Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: That may be. The hon. Member for Aberavon in the course of his remarks stated that we had only to look at the figures of educational expenditure to see when the Socialist Government was in office. That is perfectly true, but he would get exactly the same information if he looked at the unemployment figures. At all events, it would be a mistake to base the progress of education on expenditure; that is a fallacious method of measuring it. The hon. Member alluded to the expenditure of £200 per annum on a child at our public schools and compared it with the £12 spent on our elementary schools. Apart from the fact that the £200 is spent by the parents out of their own money, I have no hesitation in saying that the education at any of our elementary or secondary schools is just as good as it is at any public school that he mentioned. He referred also to the raising of the school leaving age by by-law, and wished to know whether the Board
were endeavouring to oppose the raising of the school leaving age by by-law in various areas, or whether they were agreeable that such procedure should take place. The position is quite simple. As I explained to the hon. Baronet the Member for South-West Bethnal Green (Sir P. Harris) yesterday in supplementary answer, the by-law procedure is subject to approval by the Board, and in considering whether or not the authority should be authorised to raise its leaving age there are various points which the Board can quite properly take into consideration. The hon. Member mentioned one, that if the school leaving age is raised in one area it may cause an infiltration of children in search of employment from the surrounding areas where it is not raised. He gave the example of the Greater London area. That is one consideration which the board have to take into account in coming to a conclusion whether or not an authority shall be allowed to raise its school-leaving age. Another point which he raised which seems a sound one is educational. It would clearly be most unwise to allow authorities to raise the school-leaving age where they cannot make appropriate provision, not only in accommodation, but also in that practical instruction to which we attach so much importance in the schools. If it has happened that the Board has not been satisfied that this provision has been made, the authority may no doubt consult with the Board and decide to take steps that will be sufficient. Another consideration is the state of employment, where there is very little unemployment and the few children who are unemployed are staying on, as they are in some cases, voluntarily. Finally, there is always the factor of expenditure. These conditions, two of which the hon. Baronet will agree are reasonable, are vital in taking account of the giving or withholding of permission by the board. The hon. Baronet also said something about equipment. I think he meant practical equipment. As far as I am concerned, that is one of the first considerations authorised in any school. Practical instruction and domestic science are a sine quâ non of the board's approval. When he said that he did not want reorganisation to be merely a figure, I entirely agreed with him. As far as we are concerned, it is not a figure, it is becoming a very real thing.
I now come to the point raised by the junior hon. Member for Cambridge university (Mr. G. Wilson) in the matter of State scholarships. He and I have had various correspondence and conversations on this matter, and I am afraid that we still remain in disagreement. I will tell the Committee why. As my hon. Friend pointed out in 1920 this scheme of State scholarships was first introduced and 200 were awarded. It served the very valuable purpose of encouraging boys from the grant-aided schools—and at least 70 per cent. of those boys are from public elementary schools—to go to universities, not only Oxford and Cambridge but all universities. It was right to encourage them, because the flow of children from the poorer classes to the universities was nothing like as large as it should have been. The scheme worked very satisfactorily; admirable material was forthcoming, and in 1930 the numbers were increased from 200 to 300. If I were to adopt the suggestion made by my hon. Friend it would inevitably result in throwing open the field of these 300 scholarships to non-grant-aided schools and the number of children from the grant-aided schools who would get the scholarships would pro tanto be somewhat diminished. That is an almost inevitable Conclusion. If I had any reason to think that the quality of the children coming from these grant-aided schools were inadequate, then I might be very much more sympathetic towards this proposal. My inclination and my views are, however, decidedly to the contrary. Not only is the quality entirely adequate, but I could do with more State scholarships to children from grant-aided schools. Some parents, of course, who have not sent their children to grant-aided schools find when the time comes that their resources are not what they expected. None the less, I do not think that this justifies the State in saying that it will diminish the existing number and let in others. My hon. Friend gave figures from his own college as to those who only get third-classes. I think that the percentage was much the same as among State scholars.

Mr. G. WILSON: What about the second-classes?

Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: Speaking from memory, I think that the percentage of first-classes was rather similar. The
figures are pretty good considering that over 90 per cent. of these State scholars get first or second-classes, and the number that get third-classes is precisely the same number as that of which the hon. Member has had experience in his own college.
The hon. Member for the Scottish Universities (Dr. Morrison) made a speech which all hon. Members much appreciated, and we all hope that he will intervene again on educational matters. He referred to vocational testing in our schools. This happens to be a subject in which I have taken a good deal of personal interest, and I was interested to hear his experience of the psychological laboratory attached to the schools in Rome. He hoped that we should do something of the same sort here. A certain amount of psychological work of the kind he mentioned is going on. Hon. Members are aware of the National Institute of Industrial Psychology, and local authorities in Willesden, Birmingham and elsewhere have utilised the services of experts from this Institute for the purpose of testing the children in their charge and of giving vocational guidance. Even if the result were to improve or diminish the number of misfits in the country by a small percentage, it would be well worth while. Although all these methods may be, and probably are, in their infancy, I think it is worth while for local education authorities to look into the possibilities of giving more scientific and more efficacious vocational guidance than they do at present.
The hon. Member for St. Helens (Captain Spencer) dealt with matriculation and the school certificate. He knows as well as I do the difficulties with which the situation is fraught. We are not, so to speak, masters in our own house. There are vested interests whose opposition it is necessary to remove. They are not entirely under the control of the board, and it may take time to remove these difficulties. He quoted the increase in the size of classes in the secondary schools as the result of Circular 1428. I am aware of the figures, but it is due to the bulge in our secondary schools which should be eliminated by 1937, and when that is through the position will be far more in accord with what I should like to see.
The hon. Member for the University of Wales (Mr. E. Evans) asked me about a decrease in certain figures of expenditure on Welsh education. I have not had time to look these figures up carefully, but at first sight I think he will find that the explanation is the decrease in the salaries of the teachers. I promise to look into the matter and, if there are any other reasons, to let him know. He also spoke of lack of co-ordination, and thought that the President of the Board should be in charge of all education all over the country. We are not seeking to have greatness thrust upon us but I will bear his recommendation in mind.
The Noble Lady gave us one of her very interesting and well-informed speeches upon the care of the pre-school child. I incline to emphasise that word "pre-school" because, strictly speaking, from the point of view of the Board of Education my concern is with the school child.

Viscountess ASTOR: I spoke of children in nursery schools. I hate to interrupt, but that point is decided. We had that battle, of whether the nursery schools should be under the Minister of Health or the Board of Education, and they are officially under the Board of Education, so they are yours.

Mr. RAMSBOTHAM: I agree that the schools are, but the question is whether all the pre-school children are. The Noble Lady is interested in the position of nursery schools. There again it must be remembered that in 1931 and 1932 we were faced with the necessity for financial restrictions and there was a cessation of nursery school building. I do not wish to indulge in any prophecies as to what may now occur. I can only state that within the last month or two the Board has authorised two more nursery schools, one at Swansea, and I think one at Bradford. There is nothing to prevent local authorities from submitting urgent cases or where it is considered that the circumstances have altered, from bringing fresh proposals before the beard. I do not know what the result may be but I think the Noble Lady realises that where the provision of such a school is found to be urgently necessary it is unlikely that the Board are going to be adamant for all time.
We have had a very interesting Debate upon a subject which vitally concerns the
future of all the children in our schools and therefore the future of the nation as a whole. In our educational system it is our business not only to teach these children to read and write and to use the tools of learning but to train them to think their own thoughts and not always the thoughts of other people. In the process of realising this aim it was inevitable that we should reach a stage at which hundreds of thousands of boys and girls on leaving school are susceptible and vulnerable to mass propaganda and suggestion and prone to regard the written or the printed word as gospel. Education has been defined as the art of preventing a man from being humbugged by a newspaper and I am sometimes inclined to think that a reliable educational barometer would record the advance or decline, of our educational system, in inverse ratio to the net sales of certain of our daily journals. The surest defence against that influence lies in our schools where it is our intention to train the mind and where the mind can be trained, to form calm, fair and dispassionate judgments and opinions. I have said recently outside and the Committee will forgive me if I repeat it now that ready-made thoughts seldom fit and the mental equipment which our children can be taught to fashion for themselves however scanty is preferable to the editorial reach-me-downs of the "murder and misconduct" press. In my view, and I think in the view of the Committee, the safety and stability of the nation depend upon the power of its citizens to form independent judgments and it is only by education that that power can be secured.

7.20 p.m.

Mr. MORGAN JONES: It was not my intention to take part in this discussion, but inasmuch as the Parliamentary Secretary has resumed his seat at this stage I may be permitted to make a few general observations without entering into any detailed criticism of his speech which would indeed be rather unfair, since he has already replied. I should like to make clear, however, that while I join with other hon. Members in congratulating the Parliamentary Secretary upon his excellent presentation of his case, I do not regard his apologia for the Board of Education as very convincing. Because we find it unconvincing we do not propose to take a Division now
at half-past seven o'clock as we wish to keep the discussion of these Estimates open so that if time permits and an opportunity is accorded us we may return to this subject and go into it in greater detail on a future occasion.
In making one or two general observations on the Parliamentary Secretary's statement I would refer first to the question of reorganisation. I think he will agree that the late Labour Government applied itself as strongly as it could to the task of carrying forward the work of reorganisation in the schools, and judging from the hon. Gentleman's remarks in the earlier part of these proceedings the present Government is engaged in the same task. Speaking not by way of criticism, but rather by way of expressing a hope, may I say that reorganisation ought to mean more than the mere transference of children from one type of school to another. From my point of view, reorganisation will miss its point and its purpose unless the 11 plus child is given an educational opportunity of different content from that which has been given under the old educational regime. I am not sure that in some parts of the country reorganisation has meant much more than mere transference from one school to another and that is largely useless. The Hadow Committee linked up the idea of reorganisation with the idea of raising the school age and we on this side would equally associate those two ideas. I would have been very glad had the Parliamentary Secretary been able to give us some hope to-night that the Government looked upon the proposal for the raising of the school age, nationally, in a more favourable way than is apparently the case.
It is not necessary that the Government should await a favourable political opportunity to raise the school age nationally because anyone who studies the trend of public opinion in relation to this subject must realise that education authorities are moving in that direction. They are certainly studying the proposition—to put it no higher. I agree cordially with those who take the view that it is not much worth while for one isolated education authority to be prepared to do it. At any rate if it could be done in a regional way, over large areas, it would be much more efficacious than if it were done in the more isolated way I have suggested. I would urge upon the hon. Gentleman that
whether education authorities have already put up proposals and guaranteed proper facilities for practical instruction or not, and whether the proposals made would pass an exact educational test or not, the question still remains: What is to be done with the 400,000 young people who will flow into the industrial market in the coming years? To my mind, poor as may be the accommodation and the educational equipment in some of the schools as they now are, it would be infinitely better that our children should be kept in those schools than that they should be left to flow out into the streets with nothing to occupy their time.
I wish to associate myself with the compliments which have been offered to the hon. Member for the Scottish Universities (Dr. Morrison) upon a most excellent and interesting maiden speech. I am sure that we shall all look forward, as the Parliamentary Secretary said, with the liveliest anticipation to his future incursions into debate. I was particularly attracted by that portion of his speech which referred to the Rome laboratory and the psychological tests that are being applied there. At an educational conference which I attended during the Recess an educational expert spoke on this very subject. I am at one on this point with the hon. Member, who, I was glad to see, welcomed the idea sympathetically. I am sure there is a strong case for embarking on some sort of experiment of this kind. As an old teacher, like myself, the hon. Member knows that those who have children at 13 or 14 in their charge would like to be able to assist those children in determining what their future careers should be. It is not always easy to do so. A child is not always very clear as to what he or she wants and the parents are often not well-informed as to the child's capabilities. It seems to me that a psychological test properly considered would enable headmasters whose responsibilities in this respect are bound to increase in the coming years, to assist parents much more efficiently.
I associate myself heartily with the remarks of the Noble Lady the Member for the Sutton Division of Plymouth (Viscountess Astor) in relation to the question of nursery schools. I know her interest in that matter and, with her, I am sorry that progress in the provision of these schools has not been maintained.
As I have said, we do not propose to challenge a Division on the Question now before the Committee, but we desire that this Vote should be kept open for discussion upon a future occasion.

Question, "That a sum, not exceeding £26,603,918, be granted for the said Service," put, and negatived.

Original Question again proposed.

Motion made, and Question, "That the Chairman do report Progress, and ask leave to sit again," put, and agreed to.— [Captain Margesson.]

Committee report Progress; to sit again To-morrow.

PRIVATE BUSINESS.

LONDON COUNTY COUNCIL (MONEY) BILL (By Order).

Read a Second time, and committed.

7.31 p.m.

Sir WILLIAM DAVISON: I beg to move,
That it be an Instruction to the Committee to which the Bill is referred that they amend Part I of the Schedule thereto by striking out in the second column, paragraph (c), of Item 7, the words 'or the demolition thereof and the erection of a new bridge.'
If hon. Members will turn to the Schedule to the Bill, on page 6, they will find under Item 7 of paragraph (c) that power is taken for
the reconditioning of Waterloo Bridge or the demolition thereof, and the erection of a new bridge.

The Motion, it carried, would mean that the decision already arrived at by this House two years ago, when the same question was discussed at length, shall stand and that, so far as Parliament is concerned, Waterloo Bridge shall be reconditioned to take four lines of traffic, and shall not be demolished with a view to the erection of a new bridge in its place. I feel that some apology is due to the House of Commons and to Parliament that Parliament should again be troubled with discussing a matter which they considered so fully and dealt with so decisively on the 1st June, 1932, almost exactly two years ago. I think there can be no doubt whatever that had the same London County Council as promoted the Bill two years ago been still in office they would never have dreamed of asking Parliament to reconsider the decision
which was reached at that time. Indeed, we know that this is the case, as when the new London County Council, under the leadership of Mr. Herbert Morrison, proposed that application should again be made to Parliament to provide 60 per cent. of the cost of pulling down the old bridge and building a new bridge, Sir Percy Simmons, on behalf of the party who were in a majority on the old Council, moved an Amendment to this effect—I take it from the "Times" of the 28th March:
Having regard to the fact that the Waterloo Bridge controversy had extended over 10 years, the Council, in order to secure finality, was not prepared to reopen the question, as the late Council had decided to end the controversy by accepting the offer of the Government of a grant of 60 per cent. towards the cost of reconditioning the old bridge.
If the late Council would not have applied to Parliament to reconsider this matter —and there is little doubt that, even if they had applied, Parliament would have refused to reconsider it—I am at a loss to understand why the present predominantly Conservative House should change the opinion which was expressed two years ago simply at the instance of a small Socialist majority on the London County Council, the more so as the decision again to appeal to Parliament was only carried by the small majority of 24 votes, 77 members voting for and 63 against. A great many of us in this House know and respect Mr. Herbert Morrison as a most able political organiser, and these being the facts, Mr. Morrison is now suggesting that Parliament two years ago decided that Waterloo Bridge should be reconditioned rather than pulled down without having had the case of the Port of London Authority and the river users generally before their mind. I submit that this is a travesty of the facts of the case. May I remind the House, first of all, that in the Memorandum which was sent round 2 years ago to every Member of the House by the promoters of the Bill, on page 4, the case of the river users was fully emphasised? I will quote two sentences:
From the point of view of the navigation of the river, the provision of a bridge with fewer than the present eight river arches is of the utmost importance, as the action of the tidal current upon the course of a vessel makes the navigation of the archways of the existing bridge very difficult.
Further down it emphasises the great advantage of the new bridge for the river traffic beneath it, and points to the increasing use of the river as a traffic way by colliers and other craft. This, it urges, is a most important factor for the House of Commons to consider. Secondly, at the time when this Bill was under consideration by the House of Commons two years ago, I need scarcely remind the House that the case of the river users generally was discussed at length in the public Press of the country; and thirdly, and most important of all, I would ask the House to remember that the report of the Royal Commission on Cross-River Traffic was again and again referred to in the Debate two years ago, and the conclusions arrived at by them were urged by myself and others who spoke as the proper conclusions for the House to accept, and were finally adopted by the House. In view of the strong reliance placed by Mr. Herbert Morrison on this aspect of the case, and also in view of certain paragraphs in the White Paper which has been circulated to Members, I hope I may be forgiven if I read a few paragraphs from the evidence given by Lord Ritchie, who was then, and is still, chairman of the Port of London Authority, and who addressed a meeting of Members a few weeks ago in the Grand Committee Room in Westminster Hall. The chairman of the Royal Commission said:
Lord Ritichie, you are chairman of the Port of London Authority, and you are giving evidence on their behalf. … As to the nature of the traffic (on the river), it consists, apart from certain large vessels, very largely of tugs towing six barges. … There is a tail of 480 feet long. It is that system of navigation, I suppose, which constitutes one of the chief difficulties in getting through the bridges?

Lord RITCHIE: Yes.

The CHAIRMAN: Are you satisfied that this is the best and most economical system of using the river—barges towed by tugs?

Lord RITCHIE: I think that the fact that this is how the traffic is managed is good evidence that it is the best way of it being conducted."
I want the House to notice particularly the next question and answer;

"The CHAIRMAN: They also point out that it makes exceptional difficulties in navigating the bridges, and the bridges, of course, cannot be done away with. One has to try to reconcile the two interests, of the cross-river users and the up and down river users?

Lord RITCHIE: I do not think the Port of London Authority take up the attitude that they object to bridges. I do not want you to think, for instance, that I have come here as an advocate of the destruction of Waterloo Bridge. It is an impediment to the traffic on the river, but it is not so serious an impediment as to warrant the destruction of what I think, and I think most people think, is one of the most beautiful things we have get in this country, so I do not want you to think I have come here as an advocate of that. What I have really come here for is to impress upon you the necessity there is in our opinion for our having a voice in whatever is done in the way of building new bridges across the river.

The CHAIRMAN: I cannot conceive that we would make any recommendations ignoring the Port of London Authority, which is responsible for the user of the river. I think we should not do anything of the kind; but before we leave that point, that you yourself made, with regard to Waterloo Bridge, I take it that you regard it (I am assuming now that it is in its original condition, I mean not in its present partially blocked condition) as increasing the difficulties of navigation, yet you have not regarded and do not regard it as so serious an obstacle to navigation that you wish to see it removed?

Lord RITCHIE: That is so, but that brings me to say this, if I may; amongst the other proposals or suggestions that have been made was one that the bridge should be widened. … It is easy to imagine how the difficulties of navigating the bridge would be accentuated if it was increased in width.

The CHAIRMAN: In tunnel width, you mean?

Lord RITCHIE: Yes, in tunnel width. So that if any suggestion of that kind were made, of course we (the Port of London Authority) would have a good deal to say.

The CHAIRMAN: But granting that at all times considerable skill has been required to navigate this particular bridge, it has been successfully accomplished, has it not?

Lord RITCHIE: Yes.

The CHAIRMAN: And according to a return which we have received covering the period from April, 1921, to March, 1924— that is, up to the time when the new staging was erected in connection with the bridge—there were no accidents of any sort or description, either to vessels or to cargo or to crews of the ships?

Lord RITCHIE: None at all, according to this return.

The CHAIRMAN: And it is only since the bridge has been largely blocked by the repair works that there have been some minor casualties, not to life, but a few casualties in connection with vessels passing through?

Lord RITCHIE: There appear to have been three since May, 1924.

The CHAIRMAN: But until the bridge was partially blocked there were apparently no accidents of any kind?

Lord RITCHIE: Apparently not; we have no record of it.

The CHAIRMAN: Showing that although extra skill is required, it is within the accomplishment of the river navigators?

Lord RITCHIE: Apparently so.

The CHAIRMAN: And therefore does not have to be taken into very grave account."
I have detained the House by reading what I think are very apposite quotations from the evidence given before the Royal Commission on Cross-River Traffic by the chairman of the Port of London Authority, and I ask the House to consider if anything bas occurred in the last two years which has materially altered the position. Lord Ritchie is still the chairman. He tells us he did not come as an advocate of the destruction of the bridge, and that he did not regard it as so serious an impediment to navigation that he would wish the bridge demolished. That is exactly the case that my hon. Friends and I put to the House to-day. The chairman of the Royal Commission said it was the duty of the Commission to try to reconcile the two interests, of the cross-river users and the up and down river users, and I submit that it is the same duty that lies upon Parliament to-night. The Port of London Authority have always taken the line that they would rather have no bridges at all, that if there must be bridges, they would like suspension bridges, but the bridge that they would dislike most is a tunnel bridge, and that is exactly what Mr. Herbert Morrison and the London County Council are proposing to-day.
I raised this matter when Lord Ritchie and his friends were in the Committee Room a few weeks ago, and I asked the River Superintendent of the Port of London whether he agreed that, if the length of the tunnel of the bridge were increased navigation would be more difficult, and he naturally said it would, though he qualified it by saying that the wider the tunnel the less the difficulty would be. [HON. MEMBERS: "Obviously!"] Yes; obviously. The wider the archway the less the obstruction would be, and he said that if you increased the tunnel length it added to the difficulties of navigation, though that would be mitigated if
the tunnel were widened. I agree that that is obvious. The only other point in Lord Ritchie's evidence to which I would draw the attention of the House is that until the bridge was partially blocked by the temporary bridge there was no accident of any sort either to vessels, cargo or to crews. That is a very important point. I trust that I have said enough to dispose of the contention that the case of the river users had not been fully discussed both by the Royal Commission and by the public before Parliament arrived at its decision by a large majority two years ago. The Royal Commission unanimously decided that Waterloo Bridge should be reconditioned for four lines of traffic. Their decision, which Parliament accepted, was as follows: It is proposed to corbel out the footways of the bridge so that it will take four lines of traffic instead of the present three, and by so doing it will practically double the capacity of the bridge. Four lines of bridge traffic is equivalent to six, and, many people will tell you, to eight lines of ordinary street traffic. The reason is that it is a continuous flow; there are no shops to stop the vehicles; no gas or water pipes going into premises to be repaired; and, except for the occasional repairing of the surface of the bridge, there is practically a continuous flow of traffic. At such occasional times as the road surface has to be repaired it can be done at night when the traffic is light.
Another point was that four lines of traffic, and especially four lines of bridge traffic, going into the Strand was quite as much as the Strand could take, and that, if there are six lines of bridge traffic, as is now proposed, into the Strand, it will moan confusion worse confounded. It must be remembered that when a six-line bridge was first contemplated the county council had in mind that two of the lines would be trams, but that has since been abandoned. Then it was suggested that the traffic should be taken through a subway under the Strand, but that has been found impracticable. I am told that, owing to the merry-go-round that has been created recently at Wellington Street, the traffic difficulty has been solved, but there are many Members of the House, including myself, who have waited five or six minutes in an omnibus in order to cross Wellington Street to get towards
Trafalgar Square. If there has been an improvement, there is still great room for further improvement, and goodness knows what would happen if we had six lines of traffic going into the Strand from Waterloo Bridge.
With regard to the question of river navigation, even if Lord Ritchie's evidence that practically no accident occurred prior to the repairs to the bridge had been less conclusive than it was, I submit that the system of having six barges in tow on a tug (the main cause of the difficulty in navigating the bridge), is archaic and should no longer be permitted. I have made inquiries, and I am told that on no other great European river highway is that done. I doubt if it is done in America, but I have no particular knowledge. I ask the House to consider what would have been said if in the Transport Bill which my hon. Friend the Minister of Transport is piloting so skilfully through the House, provision had been made for permitting six lorries to be attached to a tractor along the Great West Road or other highway. Why should a similar system be permitted on the Thames? If you destroy all the bridges over the river, barges can take up the whole river, but as long as there are bridges the towing of so many barges is a curious form of traffic at this time of day when all other rivers of the kind are navigated with barges with an auxiliary motor.
It must be remembered that whatever you do to Waterloo Bridge you have to go through Westminster Bridge, every arch of which, except the centre arch, is smaller than the arches of Waterloo Bridge. Moreover, the clearance of Westminster Bridge is six feet less than that of Waterloo Bridge. I submit, therefore, that the talk of providing for oceangoing steamers coming up through the new bridge at Waterloo, whether suspension or otherwise, is futile, because they would have to pass through Westminster Bridge. May I also remind the House of a matter to which attention was drawn in a letter to the "Times" the other day viz. the fact that no regulation for the use of the two arches of Waterloo Bridge has been made by the Port of London Authority whereby the left-hand arch shall be used by up-river and the right-hand arch by down-river traffic. It is plain that, un-guided, the traffic might sometimes meet
in the middle of one of the arches if our navigators were not the extraordinarily skilful men that they are.
I will refer next to the comparative cost of the proposals. The estimate of the County Council for reconditioning the bridge is £685,000. That, however, is an outside figure, and I am advised by Sir Harley Dalrymple Hay, who is the engineer to the underground railways and designed the four tubes underneath the Thames, that it is an over-estimate. On the other hand, the London County Council estimate for the erection of a new bridge is £1,296,000. This estimate, I am advised, was for a steel bridge, and not a granite-faced bridge of the type proposed by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, which would unquestionably cost more. Further, it is now proposed to have the arches 180 feet wide instead of the proposal that was made before of 150 feet arches in a steel bridge. I am told that the total cost of the new bridge, the pulling down of the temporary bridge, and the erection of a new temporary bridge would be at least £2,200,000. If, on the other hand, the bridge were reconditioned, there would be a saving of £1,500,000. The Royal Commission, the County Council, and I believe every one else are of opinion that the real key position for a bridge is at Charing Cross.
The London County Council in the statement issued yesterday dismiss the scheme as not a matter of practical politics as it would cost over £15,000,000. They failed to point out, however, what was in the estimates which they them-selves submitted in 1930 to a Parliamentary Committee, that of that amount no less than between £11,000,000 and £12,000,000 was required for pulling down Charing Cross Station and re-erecting it, pulling down the railway bridge, pulling down Coutts Bank and erecting a new bank, and a large scheme of betterment on the other side of the river. There was a sum of only £1,140,000 for the bridge itself. I am advised by the highest engineering authority that that sum is ample for the bridge, and that if you add to that sum a further amount of £1,500,000, or say £3,000,000 in all, you can have a first class traffic bridge with proper approaches, making a most valuable traffic improvement, and leaving Charing Cross Railway Bridge and
station and the other improvements until such time as the money, both municipal and national, is available.
I want the House to compare the respective dangers, difficulties, and dislocation of traffic in the two schemes. In order to carry out the county council scheme the present bridge would have to be pulled down. Waterloo Bridge is per-haps the most massive bridge in the world, for it contains 100,000 tons of granite and other material. Every pier of the bridge has 10,000 tons of granite. That will all have to be pulled down bit by bit and put into lighters, which will have to take it away. In order to get the piers down you will have to put down coffer-dams, which will be at least 65 feet in width and of considerable length. The House will readily understand the obstruction to traffic that that will cause. Gantries will have to be put up, stages provided, and hon. Members will appreciate the immense nature of the work. Then, when the bridge is removed, the temporary bridge will have to be removed, because the temporary bridge piers are in line with the piers of the present bridge. That will stop all traffic across the river at this point. If you look at a plan showing the new five-arch bridge you will find that the piers of the temporary bridge come into the open spans of the new bridge, and I am authorised by Mr. Muirhead of William Muirhead and Partners, who built Vauxhall Bridge, to say that it is an impossibility for the temporary bridge to be allowed to remain if the present stone bridge is removed. This work will take at least seven years, and very likely nine years. During a great deal of that time the traffic will be stopped altogether, and for the whole of the time it will be only two lines.
On the other hand, if you recondition the bridge, it will take at most three and a-half years, but the time for underpinning the piers will be only two years. During the whole of this time the bridge can be used for traffic except for three months, because the London County Council say that the present bridge must be lightened of certain of its roofing, but when the bridge is closed the temporary bridge will still remain open. Therefore for three and a-half years you would have four lines of
traffic in continual operation, and only for three months would the bridge be closed.
I am obliged to the House for listening to me so patiently. I had to give figures, which are sometimes boring, but I think they were apropos. Mr. Morrison, in addressing the London County Council on the 27th March, stated that the real trouble was that some people looked upon Waterloo Bridge as a monument. Waterloo Bridge is a monument, and, as Lord Ritchie stated before the Royal Commission, it is one of the most beautiful monuments in Great Britain. I pointed out to the House two years ago that Canova, the great Italian sculptor, said that it was the noblest building in the world, well worth coming all the way from Rome to London to see. But it is not only a monument it is also a war memorial, the same as the Cenotaph is to us. It was opened on the 18th June, 1817, by the Prince Regent, accompanied by the Duke of Wellington and delegations from all the British Regiments still in France, who came over for the ceremony. It was formally named The Waterloo Bridge by Act of Parliament passed in 1816, 56 Geo. III, which recited in its Preamble that
The bridge was a work of great stability and magnificence, and as such adapted to transmit to posterity the remembrance of great and glorious achievements, and that a name should be given to the bridge which should be a lasting record of the brilliant and decisive victory achieved by His Majesty's Forces in conjunction with those of his Allies on the 18th June, 1815.
Wherefore it was enacted,
That from and after the passing of this Act the said bridge shall be called and denominated The Waterloo Bridge.
For the reasons that I have given, historical, aesthetic, and practical, on grounds both of cost and of convenience, I ask the House to adhere to the decision at which they arrived, after full discussion, two years ago, and to refuse to grant public money for the pulling down of this historic national monument.

8.4 p.m.

Sir JOHN WITHERS: I beg to second the Motion.
I do so with strong hesitation and reluctance, because I have the very greatest respect for the London County Council. They do their work magnificently and are a very wonderful body. Therefore, I have great difficulty in opposing their wishes. I certainly deprecate anything in the way
of allusion to any political aspect in the composition of that body at the present time. That has no effect whatever upon me. However, I am afraid that they are making a mistake. I considered the matter in very great detail in 1932 and I came to a conclusion at that time to which I adhere to-day. I do not think that anything very serious has happened since to cause one to change that opinion.
I should like to speak from experience. I have had my office in Arundel Street, Strand, close by Waterloo Bridge, for over 40 years. I pass by the end of Wellington Street every day of my life, sometimes twice, and I have passed over the bridge very many times. My opinion is that that is entirely a wrong place for the bridge. There is no really great approach from the north. If you shift a lot of new traffic from the south into the Strand at that point, which is now congested, heaven's knows what it will be afterwards. There is certainly a roundabout by the Gaiety Theatre, on the right, but it is too much to the east. In certain portions of the day there is great congestion of traffic there. If you put there a large amount of northern bound traffic from the south there would be very great trouble. A new bridge undoubtedly should be at Charing Cross, and when prosperous times come I hope that it will be there.
The hon. Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison) has put his point very clearly. I wish to emphasise the point he made that if we get by corbelling out on the side of the bridge four actual tracks for moving traffic, that will be sufficient. If the police do their duty to see that there is no loitering, I think that four lines of moving traffic will be adequate. I am greatly impressed by the fact that the re-conditioning of the bridge would cost about half what a new bridge will cost, and would interfere less with the river traffic. A new bridge would cost double and would block the river traffic for a much longer period. Lastly, there is the aesthetic point, in which I am particularly interested. It is a wonderful old bridge, a monument of London, and I should not like to see it go. I hope that I have not kept the House too long.

8.9 p.m.

Mr. JOHN WILMOT: In asking the House to oppose the Motion for the Instruction, I should like to draw attention
to a number of statements which were made very ably by the hon. Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison). Those statements coincide with statements which have been very widely published in the Press, by circular to Members of Parliament, and by all manner of propaganda means, with a view to influencing the House on this matter. If I may say so with respect, the Mover of the Motion has done a disservice to his cause by introducing into what is essentially a matter of the good Government of London, and not a matter of party politics, considerations of a party political character. That it is not a party question is evidenced by the fact that the old council, like the new council, were unanimously of opinion that on its merits the building of a new bridge is the best method of dealing with this difficult and long-delayed question. It is inaccurate to say that on the London County Council there is a party division on the question of rebuilding and reconditioning. There is nothing of the kind. Both councils, old and new, are unanimous in their belief that, on the merits of the question, tactics aside, to rebuild the bridge is the best course. It is very unfortunate to convey the impression, which perhaps the hon. Member might not have intended to convey, that this is a matter of party politics on the London County Council. It is not, and I feel sure that it will not be a matter of party politics in this House.
The hon. Member for South Kensington has, I hope unwittingly, gravely misrepresented the situation and misled the House with nearly all the figures which he quoted. He said that they were apropos, but they were certainly not accurate. In view of the fact that those figures have been used in every attempt to create opinion on this matter, I think it is vitally necessary that the real facts about these curious figures should be known. A very important part of the propaganda against a new Waterloo Bridge has taken the form of casting doubts upon the competence of the council's engineer and their engineering advisors. It is suggested in this propaganda, in letters to the newspapers, and again to-night by the hon. Member for South Kensington that the estimates which the council have given as to the
relative cost of rebuilding and reconditioning bear no relation to the real facts. Eminent authority has been quoted to inflate the figures to enormous proportions.

Sir W. DAVISON: indicated dissent.

Mr. WILMOT: The hon. Member shakes his head, but, if I heard him aright, he inflated a figure of £750,000 into £2,250,000, no small increase, and in doing that he threw direct doubt upon the competency of the estimates of the Council's engineers and advisers. It has been stated that the cost of building the bridge in accordance with the design of Sir Giles Gilbert Scott would be £2,200,000. The Council are not committed to that design or any other, but that design has been used as the basis for estimate and on the basis of that design the estimates of the Council's engineers and advisers is not £2,200,000 but £1,295,000. Therefore, the hon. Member made a trifling inaccuracy of nearly £1,000,000.
It is further suggested by opponents, and I think it is most important that the real facts should be known, that the time during which there would be, admittedly, interference with the navigation on the river and the cross-river road traffic, would for building the new bridge be greatly in excess of the time which would be taken in reconditioning the present bridge. The hon. Member's estimates seem to grow by what they feed on. In the first exaggerated estimate that I saw the time occupied for building a new bridge will be seven years, but the hon. Member has now thrown in another couple of years and the time has now become nine years.

Sir W. DAVISON: Seven to nine years.

Mr. WILMOT: On the other side he said the time for reconditioning the bridge would be two or three years. Fortunately, I am in a position this evening to give the House, with the authority of the London County Council, some important facts which bear upon those quite inaccurate statements. The House will remember that in pursuance of a decision arrived at previously the County Council invited tenders for reconditioning the bridge. Owing to the great amount of detail which has had to be examined it is only possible for me to place before
the House certain general particulars with regard to those tenders, but sufficient definite information is available— not on estimates, but on actual tenders to which the contractors will be bound —to show that the hon. Member's figures and estimates are very wide of the actual facts.
The original estimate for reconditioning was £685,000. That figure included some £65,000 for overhead charges and engineering expenses. If that £65,000 be deducted, in order to get the actual cost of reconditioning and to obtain a comparable figure with the tenders, the figure is £620,000. The council received 29 tenders from 17 firms. They invited the tenderers to submit tenders for alternative schemes. The lowest five of the tenders which comply with the council's formulated scheme range from. £574,000 to £615,000. The lowest tender, therefore, is within 7½ per cent. of the council's own estimate. Having regard to the range of the tenders I think the hon. Member will agree that the council's estimate was startlingly accurate; it came almost exactly to the actual figure of the tender. The advertisement for these tenders was an open one. In the light of this surprisingly accurate estimating the House, in considering the estimates of the council's engineers and their advisers, is entitled to regard them as competent estimators, and can set aside these, if I may say so, unjust statements that we ought to ignore entirely the estimates made by the London County Council.

Sir W. DAVISON: I did not quarrel with the £685,000. I said, on the contrary, that my advisers thought it was too high, and I understand now that it is too high.

Mr. WILMOT: I am afraid the hon. Member has not quite followed my point. My point is that if the council's engineers and advisers can forecast with such remarkable accuracy the cost of reconditioning the bridge, what reason have we to throw doubt upon their estimate for rebuilding, and what right bas the hon. Member to inflate their figure for rebuilding the bridge by nearly a million pounds? This inaccuracy in such a grave matter, because this has to be considered as an urgent business proposition, is even worse when we come to the question of time. Time is very strictly of the essence of this contract. The time which it will
take to recondition the bridge has been estimated by the council as accurately as the cost. The council estimate that the time will be about five years, and the 29 tenders vary as to time from four to six and a-half years, the average being five years and four months. So that when the hon. Member speaks of reconditioning this bridge in two years——

Sir W. DAVISON: I said three and a-half years.

Mr. WILMOT: Two to three and a-half years, I understood.

Sir W. DAVISON: No, three and a-half years for reconditioning the bridge, but the rebuilding of the two defective fliers and arches will take only two years, and the whole bridge will be open for traffic the whole time except for three months.

Mr. WILMOT: The hon. Member will, no doubt, be interested to know that the tenderers require an average of five years and four months, so that he has not only been grossly inaccurate about the cost but is two years wrong as to time. Here, again, the council's engineers and advisers have been absolutely accurate. The hon. Member spoke also of the added obstruction to navigation which would be involved in rebuilding. No doubt he will be very interested to learn that none of the tenderers could undertake to fulfil the minimum requirements of the Port of London Authority. The Port of London Authority laid down certain minimum requirements of navigation. I need not trouble the House with a technical description of those requirements, but none of the tenderers was able to satisfy them.

Sir P. HARRIS: Is this a public document?

Mr. WILMOT: I am quoting from information which has been supplied to me on the authority of the London County Council, and I suggest that the House must be in possession of this information if it is to come to an informed decision. None of the tenderers would be able, while reconditioning the bridge, to maintain the minimum navigational facilities; but the council's engineers, whose competence and accuracy have been established, I submit, say that they can maintain all that the Port of London Authority asks for while building a new
bridge, and that they can build the new bridge within five years. Actually, therefore, the time involved will be less and the obstruction caused will be less.
The hon. Member went on to speak of the advantages of the Charing Cross Bridge scheme. I agree that it is impossible to consider this matter without also considering alternative traffic routes over the Thames, The House will agree that the hon. Member for South Kensington was wrong when he tried to isolate the cost of building Charing Cross Bridge from the cost of building the approaches to the bridge. A very large proportion of the cost of the Charing Cross Bridge scheme was the cost of the improvements both on the north and the south sides. It would be folly to contemplate a new bridge without at the same time making it usable, and it is the preparation of the approaches to the bridge in the south and the removal of obstructions to traffic on the north which involve the very heavy cost of the scheme.
When the commission considered this matter and recommended that the present Waterloo Bridge should be reconditioned to take four lines of traffic, they coupled with the recommendation the further recommendation that a new road bridge should be built at Charing Cross; it was, in fact, part of the same recommendation, They said, "We want 10 lines of traffic over the Thames within that sector," and they said: "We will provide for six at Charing Cross and four by repairing Waterloo Bridge." The recommendation was that the two developments should go on simultaneously, and, if there is to be no bridge for some years at Charing Cross, it becomes vitally necessary, in the interests of cross-river traffic, that six lines of traffic shall be provided at Waterloo.
In considering the Charing Cross Bridge scheme it is extremely important to remember what it involves. As the hon. Member has said, it involves spending some £15,000,000 of public money on the bridge and its approaches. Financial considerations are less stringent than they were when Parliament turned down the Charing Cross Bridge scheme, and I think I am right in my recollection when I say that the hon. Member for South Kensington, who is now
extolling the Charing Cross Bridge scheme, was one of those whose votes helped to defeat the only concrete scheme for a bridge at Charing Cross that has ever been put forward.

Sir W. DAVISON: I was not on the Committee.

Mr. WILMOT: The Charing Cross Bridge scheme together with the reconditioning of Waterloo Bridge, that would provide 10 lines of traffic, involves expenditure of over £16,000,000. The suggestion of the London County Council is that six lines of traffic be provided at Waterloo Bridge, and the total cost of that will be £1,295,000. That, they suggest will provide for the traffic requirements in that sector of the river for the time being, and will meet the requirements as far as we can see ahead. While the Charing Cross Bridge scheme is not ruled out, it is felt by the council that money is wanted for urgent public needs, and that with the provision of six lines of traffic at Waterloo Bridge are more urgent, in point of time and in public consideration, than the Charing Cross scheme. The council feel, and I feel, that the House will support them in their proposal that, so long as adequate traffic facilities are provided, no money should be diverted from slum clearance and rehousing proposals. It is with the very great difficulty in mind of finding the necessary money for such purpose's which will be required, over and above the heavy expenditure of Charing Cross, that the council now make this suggestion.
I saw the suggestion again in the "Times" of this morning that the rebuilding of Waterloo Bridge would destroy for ever the hope of clearing up that patch of squalor on the south bank. I fail to see how anybody can logically accept that statement. Why should it be that a new bridge at Charing Cross will automatically town-plan the south bank of the Thames while a new Waterloo Bridge will automatically destroy all hope of that town-planning? The present chaotic condition of the south bank is, in my view and in the view of the overwhelming majority of all parties on the London County Council a disgrace and a blot on London. The south bank between Westminster Bridge and Black-friars Bridge is the geographical heart
of London. Properly planned and developed, it could be a pride and a joy to the city.

Sir W. DAVISON: Let us get on with it.

Mr. WILMOT: I am glad to hear the hon. Member say that. That is exactly what the London County Council want to do. If the hon. Gentleman will read the proceedings of the council, and I am afraid he does not, judging from a quotation which he made earlier in his speech——

Sir W. DAVISON: I quoted from the "Times."

Mr. WILMOT: That was only half of it, and that was the unfortunate thing about it. If the hon. Gentleman had read the whole quotation he would have seen that members of the council unanimously affirmed their belief in that same resolution that a new bridge at Waterloo was the best thing. He did not quote that. If he had followed the proceedings of the London County Council, he would have seen that they had in mind to set about the job of replanning and redeveloping the south bank of the Thames. That is one of the necessary collateral developments, with this long-drawn out controversy of Waterloo Bridge, which should be settled once and for all.
I hope that the House will pay no attention to purely irresponsible statements that, if permission be given to the council to rebuild Waterloo Bridge, that automatically destroys the hope of town-planning on the south side. The hon. Member for South Kensington spoke about the difficulties which would be created by six lines of traffic being emptied into the Strand. Nobody proposes that six lines of traffic should be emptied into the Strand, because three lines will come out of the Strand and three lines will go into the Strand. Three will go south and three will go north; so the hon. Member here again bas inflated his problem by 100 per cent. The position is one upon which I am not competent to pass judgment. I see that the hon. Member for Central Wands-worth (Sir H. Jackson), who for many years has rendered distinguished service as Chairman of the London and Home Counties Traffic Advisory Committee, made an authoritative pronouncement on
this question when the House was considering the matter two years ago, and, if I am not wearying the House with what I think is of vital importance, I will quote a few words of what is considered an expert opinion arising out of a very ripe experience. He said:
We are convinced that, if there were a bridge with six lines of traffic there"—
that is, at Waterloo Bridge—
the present fluidity of traffic is such that not only would congestion not happen but that the traffic would be admirably dealt with. The police report on congestion in the neighbourhood of the Strand since this experiment"—
of the roundabout—
was tried is that it has resulted in a steady improvement in the flow of traffic … We are confident that by that method we have the answer to our friends who ask how we can deal with the six lines of traffic over Waterloo Bridge."—[OFFICIAI. REPORT, 1st June, 1932; col. 1277, Vol. 266.]
That is the opinion, if I may say so, of the Member of this House who has the greatest possible authority on questions of London traffic, and I see no reason why the House should cease to have regard for it.
There is another very important side to this question, which was touched upon by the hon. Member. It is possibly the paramount consideration, for London stands upon the Thames because it is the Thames— because it is a navigable river; and, while other considerations have to be given their due weight, I think that probably the vital thing in dealing with the Thames is to maintain its navigation. I have shown that in the estimates received for this work, although the tenderers knew that they were required to preserve certain minimum navigational facilities, they were quite unable to do so. This question of navigation is a very technical one, and I should hope that the hon. Member for South Kensington will agree that, in quoting, as he did, the evidence of Lord Ritchie before the Royal Commission, he was doing him a great injustice——

Sir W. DAVISON: No.

Mr. WILMOT: Lord Ritchie is the chairman of the Port of London Authority, and Lord Ritchie claimed, the hon. Member said, to have the voice of the Port of London Authority heard when alterations of London's bridges were in contemplation. The voice of the Port of
London Authority has been heard on this very matter which we are discussing today, in a considered statement——

Sir W. DAVISON: indicated dissent.

Mr. WILMOT: Because the hon. Member does not agree with it, I hope he is not going to try to stifle it. The Port of London Authority have issued an authoritative pronouncement on this problem which we are considering to-day, but, as this is a highly technical question, I will leave it to another Member of the House, the hon. Member for Dartford (Mr. Clarke), who speaks with unquestioned authority as one who has personal knowledge of the problems concerned, to deal with the navigational aspect of the matter. In the few minutes that remain, might I refer to the various appeals which have been made for the preservation of the architecture of this fine old bridge, Rennie's masterpiece? I yield to no one in my love of and devotion to the beauty of London, and especially the beauty of old London, but I think we are bound to have regard to the necessities of a modem city. We are bound to have regard to questions of comfort and convenience and to the possibility of (modern trade and modern commerce. But, if I may say so to the hon. Member with all respect, we are not faced with the alternative of destroying a beautiful piece of architecture or of preserving it. The chance of preserving it has already gone; it has itself fallen down. [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] It has fallen down. No one who looks at it to-day can do so without a feeling of sorrow and, indeed, of some shame. For more than 10 years that bridge has been in splints, with a bad and sorrowful crack in two of its beautiful arches, and I was thinking today, as I passed a school, that no child in that school has ever seen Waterloo Bridge in any other condition. The alternative before us is not preservation or destruction; the alternative before us is whether we will bow to the inevitable, realise that the bridge has served its purpose, and let it go, or whether we will so deal with it as to render it a mere shadow and distortion of its previous beauty.
I would like, if I may, to quote one other eminent opinion. I suppose that the hon. Member will not question the
competence of Sir Edwin Lutyens. This problem of how to preserve the beauty of the bridge and yet render it capable of dealing with modern conditions was submitted to that eminent artist and architect. He said that he had explored every avenue of approach to this problem, with due regard to the data and the drawings of the engineers, and he had, he feared, been unable to arrive at any satisfactory design whereby the bridge could be widened by corbelling it out. He said:
To overhang the footways would altogether destroy the architectural character of Rennie's bridge, which relies entirely upon the spontaneous and direct motive of arch and pillared buttress. The narrowness of the bridge emphasises its robust character, and to link the buttresses with any horizontal line that would throw into shadow the crown of the arches would completely mutilate the character of the original design, and would create, in fact, not only a new bridge, but an ugly one.
That is the opinion of, perhaps, the greatest architect of modern times; and Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, whose name was most improperly attached to propaganda of the character which I have described, has himself said that he is entirely opposed on aesthetic grounds to this treatment of Rennie's bridge. I am afraid I have detained the House too long, but in conclusion might I repeat that we have not the alternative of preserving unimpaired this admitted architectural masterpiece or of building a new bridge; the alternative before us is so to mutilate the character of Rennie's bridge as to desecrate the memory of that great artist and at the same time fail to provide either the cross-river traffic facilities or the under-bridge navigation facilities which those most competent to express an opinion demand.
The hon. Member very eloquently called upon history to support his case, but I am afraid he does not realise the extent to which the verdict of history is sharply against him. I came across to-day, among a small collection of books which I have on London's history, this very interesting volume issued by the Corporation of London, as the bridges authority for the City, on the completion of the Tower Bridge some 40 years ago. It contains the history of all London's bridges, and, on looking through it again, especially
as to the history of London Bridge, I was amazed to find that there was an hon. Member—not for South Kensington, but for somewhere else—who took precisely the same attitude towards the demolition of Old London Bridge. In taking that attitude, he was standing on much more ancient and hallowed ground than we are to-day, for Old Peter Colechurch's bridge had stood there since 1174, nearly 700 years. The same debates went on in this House, and the same debates went on on the bridges authority of that day. Money was poured out to recondition, to widen, to corbell, to underpin, and in the end they had to build a new bridge. History has precisely repeated itself in the case of Waterloo Bridge, and, curiously enough, when the new London Bridge came to be built, the London Bridge which stands to-day it was built by Rennie and his father, the same Rennie who built Waterloo Bridge, which has nobly served us but has failed to withstand the very special stresses caused by the set of the tide at the apex of the great bend of London's river. I hope the House will face this problem as an urgent business problem of good London government and will pass the Bill without the Instruction in order that the authority which Parliament itself has appointed as the bridges authority for London may be able unencumbered to get on with its work.

8.45 p.m.

Mr. CLARKE: Before stating the case for the navigational interests so closely linked with the problem of Waterloo Bridge, I should like to tell the House how much I appreciate the work done by the London Committee and all those bodies concerned with the amenities of London. In doing this I know that I am voicing the feelings of all those organisations for which I speak. Surely no Englishman can fail to be thrilled by the romance and the historic memories which cling around our ancient monuments. Surely no Englishman would ruthlessly destroy any one of them. But I am certain that everyone here will agree that our country has greater historical and romantic interests than those connected with ancient monuments. Surely we hold more dearly the historic recollections and romantic traditions of our great industries and the lives of our countrymen who are carrying on those industries. If
it was a question of saving one or the other, we should perforce save the livelihood of our people first. Suppose a beautiful country mansion were on fire, however wonderful and romantic its history, one's first thought would be for the people inside, and then we should preserve as much of the building as possible. I contend that this describes symbolically the problem that we have before us. Waterloo Bridge has certain aesthetic values for all of us but, as it stands to-day, it menaces the industrial development and the livelihood of thousands of our people. It is my privilege, as a practical freeman of the River Thames, to emphasise the views of the Port of London Authority, the Association of Master Lightermen, the Thames River Users Association, the British Chambers of Commerce and, last but not least, the men who work the river, men who by their skill and courage for many centuries have gained for themselves a privilege possessed by the men of no other river in the world
With all the expert experience and knowledge that they have behind them, all these bodies are united in their opinion that the opportunity should be taken to demolish the existing bridge and re-erect in its place a bridge with greater facilities for navigational progress. Although they feel a suspension bridge to be the ideal to be aimed at they recognise that other considerations may make this impracticable. They are of the very definite opinion, however, that the minimum requirements of present day river traffic demand a bridge at the bend of the river here of not more than five arches. They are also unanimously of the opinion that Waterloo Bridge is the greatest obstacle to river navigation to-day. There are many difficulties. The arches are too small—there are eight in all—the bridge is at the apex of a bend and the navigator has no clear vision through the arches. In steering a vessel up through the bridge it is necessary to lake into consideration the cross set of the tide and to steer more or less for a buttress of the bridge, allowing for the tide to carry you through. This is a very precarious bit of navigation and in certain conditions it is almost impossible. If one studies the photographs that were circulated at the recent meeting, one will see the scores in the archways where vessels have bumped through.
There are greater difficulties at the top of spring tide, when a great amount of land water is often coming down from the Tipper reaches and when there is a very rapid flow. There are other difficulties at the lowest neaps, when the water is at times very restricted under the arches and with certain squalls and other freaks of the elements larger vessels find the navigation extremely difficult. It is, perhaps, not known to all that there are only three hours on the top of each tide when it is possible for the larger vessels to navigate the bridge, and only five hours in the case of smaller vessels. The dangers of collision in consequence are very considerable and, with the constant increase of traffic and the great number of petrol barges passing up, a collision would be a very serious thing.
It is necessary to have some conception of the magnitude of the Port of London in sizing up the situation with regard to navigation through Waterloo Bridge. There is a great danger in the future of this becoming a bottle-neck in the navigation of the river. The Port of London extends over 75 miles. There are 700 acres of enclosed dock water and 55,000,000 tons coming into the port with cargoes valuing over £700,000,000. The Thames is still the great highway of London and its extension is going on rapidly in the direction of the upper reaches. It is an actual fact that no fewer than 400 to 500 vessels pass underneath the bridge every tide, and no less than 55,000 tons of material are carried through it every day of the week. That material is absolutely essential to the communal life of London. It represents food supplies, raw materials for factories, huge quantities of coal for the Water Board's pumping stations, the big power stations and gas undertakings. There are also the general goods going to the various railheads and the huge tonnage of refuse which serves the sanitary service for London. This is an ever-increasing traffic, and it is obvious that sooner or later it will reach a point when, if the bridge is not pulled down and a fresh bridge put in its place, traffic will have to be restricted and, when restriction of traffic comes, it will not be possible to get those materials to the various factories and other places except by road, which will increase the road problem very considerably.
The river workers will also suffer unless something is done to the bridge. They have already suffered considerably during the last few years. There is a great amount of unemployment among the dockers and river workers. They have been hit very badly by the advent of the light-draught Dutch motor vessels carrying goods direct from the Continent to the upper portions of the river, and the arrival of the tariff has for the time being affected their trade very considerably inasmuch as a great amount of stuff now comes over in the form of raw material and is manufactured here and the tonnage is correspondingly low. Therefore, we must in our consideration of the matter take into account the men who have worked the river for so many years, because they played a great part in our national history. Many of the men who were recruited to man the ships that were built on this great river years ago went out to fight the Armada and took part in many of our maritime wars. The river continues to breed a no less daring race. These men are very skilful navigators, they played a very great part in the last War and their livelihood is a matter of consideration for Parliament.
On the subject of the various points of opposition which have been very skilfully dealt with already, I would like to say something on the question of the length of the archways. It has been said that if the archways were lengthened it would increase the difficulties of navigation. The navigator would not agree. If he were given an extra width of arch he would be thoroughly compensated in vision. Therefore, there is nothing; in that argument. The point that the bridge is not an obstacle is not agreed to by practical men on the river. All are unanimous in their opinion. The experts say that the bridge should come down, and they agree with them.

Lord BALNIEL: The hon. Member says that all experts are agreed that the bridge should come down. May I point out that Lord Ritchie states in evidence:
I do not want you to think that I have come as an advocate for the destruction of Waterloo Bridge. It is an impediment to the traffic of the river, but it is not so serious an impediment as to warrant the destruction of the bridge.

Mr. CLARKE: It is true that Lord Ritchie made that statement before the Royal Commission, but it is nearly seven
years ago, and the colossal increase of tonnage since that time has caused even Lord Ritchie to change his point of view. Practical men say most definitely that this brdige is the greatest obstacle on the River Thames. If one took the advice of a specialist as to having his tonsils out and he were advised to do so, he would not go to a veterinary surgeon afterwards. This subject has been very near getting into a party controversy. I was very disappointed to hear earlier in the day that various people were going to vote against the London County Council. I do not think that that is quite the right point of view on a big question of this sort which affects the lives of so many people and the great industrial development of those ports in the upper reaches of the River Thames. We must remember what the river means to us, and in this connection I will quote the words of the Poet Laureate:
A thousand landmarks perish,
A hundred streets grow strange,
With all the dreams they cherish
They go the ways of change.
But, whatso towers may tumble
And, whatso bridges fall,
And, whatso statues crumble
Of folks both great and small,
The oldest thing in London,
He changes not at all.

9 p.m.

Sir MURDOCH MACDONALD: I rise to support the Motion, because I think that it is unnecessary that anyone should go to the expense of building a new bridge when the present one can be adapted to fit in with the general circumstances of the area which it is intended to serve, notwithstanding what the two speakers who have just preceded me have said. The first hon. Gentleman stated that we have to deal with the merits of the case. He twitted my hon. Friend who proposed the Motion with not having dealt with the merits, but I am afraid that when he reads the OFFICAL REPORT to-morrow he will be compelled to say the same thing about the speech, however eloquent it was, which he himself delivered. After all, this is a practical engineering problem, and the question is, what are the merits of the case and what requirements are to be served by a bridge across the river at this point? Any work of this sort, whether the reconditioning of Waterloo Bridge or the construction of an entirely new bridge of different dimensions,
should form part of a co-ordinated scheme of development for its own and adjacent parts of the river. Anything that may be done on the site of the present Waterloo Bridge should fit in with a town planning scheme which would, in my view, necessitate the construction of a Charing Cross Bridge. The hon. Member who moved the Motion, and the first hon. Member who spoke in support of it, agreed that a Charing Cross Bridge was a desirable thing, but I was amazed to hear the hon. Gentleman the Member for East Fulham (Mr. Wilmot) say that the proposal was to deal with 10 lines of traffic. I doubt if the hon. Gentleman realised that these two bridges —Charing Cross and Waterloo—are not parallel bridges which, when crossing the river, would, as a consequence, serve different areas.

Mr. WILMOT: Perhaps I ought to point out that this was not my suggestion or the suggestion of the London County Council, but the recommendation of the Royal Commission.

Sir M. MACDONALD: Whoever made it, let us deal with it as it is. These two bridges are not parallel. If they were parallel they would deal with different areas on either side of the river. On this side they would both debouch into the Strand, and on the other side it is conceivable that they would have two main arteries which would feed them, and to some considerable extent they might be regarded as independent, but that is not the case at all, These two bridges converge rapidly. Indeed, they converge so much that lines drawn along the centre of them would meet at no great distance on the other side of the river. They would meet somewhere opposite the present entrance to Waterloo Station. Meeting there, they would have one main artery leading away. That one main artery would feed the two bridges. The hon. Member is shaking his head. Here are two bridges crossing the river, and shortly after crossing the river there would be one artery leading away. They could have a lot of branch roads coming in down the New Cut beyond Waterloo Station. A big plage could be built such as was put down on the original plan with a whole series of roads leading into it. But it was meant by such a plage that one road would serve both the Waterloo Bridge and the Charing Cross
Bridge. I know something about it because I put up the alternative scheme.
It is proposed to erect an entirely new bridge at Waterloo with six lines of traffic, and to build a bridge at Charing Cross, the two bridges converging on the other side of the river with one main artery serving both. Is it reasonable to put six lines of traffic on either or both of these bridges? What main artery can possibly carry traffic of that nature? No argument has been put before the House to substantiate a proposal to build a new Waterloo bridge with six lines of traffic. What is the position now? Roughly, with the temporary bridge and the existing bridge you have two lines of traffic. There was not much congestion on the bridge before the disaster took place, nor has there been since, but when the traffic gets to the Strand it becomes congested. If you put up a bridge with six lines of traffic, just imagine the amount of congestion which will take place in the Strand. It would be practically impossible to deal with it at one point. Therefore I see no reason why the present bridge should not be reconditioned. There is no engineer who will not agree that it could be done easily, and I have heard that about 25 contractors have lodged tenders offering to do the work. There can be no question about the possibility of reconditioning.
The only point left is the amount of traffic which the bridge can be made to carry. I understand that the county council have produced a satisfactory plan with exactly the same width of roadway as Lambeth Bridge, that is, 36 feet wide, for four lines of traffic. What more is required? I understand that there is also ample footway for foot passengers. There is a small amount of overhang, four feet and an inch or two, and if a couple of feet extra are added to that on either side a very excellent footpath can be provided, with four lines of traffic on the 36-foot roadway. Therefore as far as traffic is concerned there is no necessity to spend £500,000 extra in order to build a new bridge. Then there is the question of the river traffic. The hon. Member for Dartford (Mr. Clarke) said that the Port of London Authority would like a new bridge. Every interest in the country would like the taxpayer and the ratepayer to spend money for their benefit.
Has there ever been a suggestion by the Port of London Authority that they will subscribe towards this scheme? It would be only reasonable if they were to say "it is going to benefit us and we will subscribe to it." If motorists want a road widened a tax is put upon them by the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the money is found. If railways want additional facilities they have to find the money themselves, and if the Port of London Authority want a bridge widened they should subscribe to it in the same way as other people. Why should the whole of the burden be put on the taxpayer or ratepayer?
Therefore, on the ground that the bridge can be reconditioned, whatever figures are taken, at considerably less cost than a new bridge would cost, and on the ground that four lines of traffic are ample in the circumstances I support the Instruction. And also on the ground that river traffic is not at the present moment impeded. Since the temporary bridge has been put up with a couple of arches shut to traffic in Waterloo Bridge, the conditions in the river are not as they would be if the bridge was reconditioned and in its normal state. There has been no suggestion of accidents, and if a barge does hit a pier and takes off some of its paint is that a reason for spending £500,000 extra. On all these grounds I hope the House will agree with the proposal that Waterloo Bridge should be reconditioned.

9.12 p.m.

Sir WILLIAM RAY: I do not intend to take up the time of the House for any length of time but I feel that as one who took some part in the discussions in this House two years ago, and has been connected with the controversy over this bridge for the last 10 years, that it is incumbent upon me to say something in this Debate. Two years ago I had the opportunity of speaking on behalf of the London County Council. To-day I have not that opportunity, but as one who has taken an interest in London administrative problems for more than a quarter of a century perhaps I may claim the indulgence of the House in saying a few words on this new attempt to bring the matter before Parliament. When the House decided two years ago to refuse the request of the London County Council we
thought that the matter was more or less closed. At the beginning of 1933 we made representations to His Majesty's Government again and put forward our point of view, and the Government decided that no alteration could be made in the decision at which the House had arrived. The London County Council by resolution reluctantly acquiesced in the decision of the Government. We proceeded to take the necessary steps, as outlined by the hon. Member for East Fulham (Mr. Wilmot), to secure tenders from various people for the reconstruction of Waterloo Bridge on lines that were decided by the Government of the day.
Things have changed, of course, in the last few months, and the London County Council again comes to this House and asks the House practically to reverse its decision. I feel that I must join with the London County Council in forwarding that request. One must follow out the ideas that one has held for all these years, that in the circumstances, without any possibility at the moment of a Charing Cross Bridge being in sight, in the interests of London and London traffic, a new six-line bridge is essential. As one who loves London and London government my vote to-night must be given in favour of the request of the London County Council. We did not think that this question would be reopened. I want Members of the House to realise that the scheme originally was a scheme of the party in power, opposed by the party which is in power now. It was brought forward by the party with which I was connected, and in the welter of politics, in spite of the many stupid things that had been done by the London County Council in the last couple of months, such as the abolition of Empire Day, this is one bright spot on their record, where they have had the courage to follow me.
I feel that the House to-night is pursuing something of a dream. It does not matter what this House decides to-night. Whatever point of view the House takes, the decision of those responsible for London administration has been made. For 10 years we have been reproached for our vacillating policy and all the rest of it, and have been urged by the leaders of the present London County Council to have the courage to put the cost on London rates and to defy the
House of Commons. [HON. MEMBERS: "No!"] Yes, I have quotations here. The present leader of the London County Council went so far in 1932 as to say that if he were in my position as leader of the council he would vindicate the right of self-government in London and he would pay out of the rates for five years. So I say, with all respect, that the policy of the London County Council is already determined. But of course, if this House is willing to give a percentage of the cost the county council is going to accept it gracefully, or I should say gratefully; and if this House does not do that, the decision to place it on the rates has already been taken by those responsible for London administration.
I hope that the House will give the necessary 60 per cent. of the cost of the new bridge. [HON. MEMBERS: "Why?"] I will state why, if I may. [HON. MEMBERS: "Why should the rest of the country pay?"] I am asked, why should the rest of the country pay? London has not done too well out of the Road Fund for many years. It contributes very heavily to the Road Fund, and some of us think that London might get a greater share out of the fund than it has had. That is the reason why the rest of the country might do something for London, when the rest of the country is always asking London to help it.
I appeal for support of the London County Council's decision to-night because I believe that the one essential in London to-day is the development of the South bank. I appeal for that support, not because I believe a new Waterloo Bridge will do anything to help the development of the South bank, but because I believe that we may induce the Minister of Transport, or someone from his Department, to indicate that the Charing Cross Bridge project is not dead. If some of us could get an assurance that that is still within the realm of practical politics, we are quite prepared to support a four-line traffic bridge at Waterloo— quite prepared. I for one, if I could receive such an assurance would be prepared to support the Motion of my hon. Friend the Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison); but without that assurance one feels that it is essential to advocate a new six-line bridge at Waterloo. I believe the development of
the South bank is entirely or practically dependent upon a Charing Cross Bridge scheme and the establishment of a great railway terminus on the other side of the river. It speaks volumes for the Southern Railway that they were prepared to assist the County Council a few years ago in that direction. I think there is hope even to-day that we could secure a development of that kind. But failing the assurance I have asked for, one is bound to support any scheme whatever which provides that at Waterloo Bridge there should be a six-line traffic bridge.
Of course, it is unfortunate that two years ago we were met by the claims not merely of those who professed to call themselves aesthetics, but by the current demand for economy. I cannot grumble at the use of the word economy. I do not think we hear enough of it to-day. We shall have to hear more of it in the days to come, especially from those people who ask for reduced Income Tax and want to maintain public expenditure at a high rate. But so far as the pry for economy is concerned, the final words on the Charing Cross Bridge proposals were made by those people who are responsible for the carrying on of affairs at County Hall at the present time. It was only the maladministration of public finance by the last Socialist Government that was responsible for the then Socialist Minister of Transport, who is now coming to this House and asking the House to give him 60 per cent. of the cost of a new bridge —it was only that maladministration of public finance that caused the Minister of Transport of that year to tell the County Council that it could not be done because the money was not available.
To-day, just because we preach a doctrine of economy throughout the country and get it more or less carried out, and because His Majesty's National Government have been able to bring to this country something in the nature of a return to former prosperity—now that we have that beneficial result from the operations of the two great parties, in the municipalities and the Government, hon. Members of the Socialist administration, which nearly ruined the whole show, come along and ask for this further grant. I do not think, however, that that ought to make this House refuse their demand. I do not think that they ought to be penalised because of their misdeeds
in the past, and I for one, being a totally unresentful person, am prepared to support the London County Council in their demand this evening. The whole scheme from our point of view was put back as soon as the Royal Commission on Cross-River Traffic had reported in favour of a Charing Cross Bridge. We gave way on the question of the new bridge at Waterloo. Our Bill was defeated by a Select Committee—I would remind the hon. Member for East Fulham (Mr. Wilmot)— and not by the House of Commons.
Our second Bill, produced under the guidance of a Committee presided over by Sir Leslie Scott, was not proceeded with because according to the dictates of the Minister, there was not money in the Exchequer or the Road Fund. We were ultimately reduced to going back to our original project. I do not want to say, as the hon. Member said, that the decision of the London County Council in this respect was always unanimous, but we always had a comfortable majority in favour of the six-line bridge. Parties took the same attitude on this question. I have made these few remarks in order to reassure some friends of mine that some of us are still in favour of a new Waterloo Bridge in lieu of an indication from the Minister of Transport that a Charing Cross bridge of some kind is still within the realm of practical politics. Failing that assurance, we must support the London County Council in its present demands.

9.28 p.m.

Lieut.-Colonel APPLIN: I feel that we are being asked to look at what we have already looked at, and to come to a decision which this House has already made. After a considerable Debate, at which I was present, we came to the decision that Waterloo Bridge was necessary as a matter of economy, as a matter of necessity, and as being the best means of getting the traffic across the river. It is well known to everybody who has ever crossed Waterloo Bridge that it is placed at a very awkward point. It runs into the Strand at a narrow place, and traffic cannot get out into the Strand except by going right or left. The bridge will only carry at the present moment four lines of traffic, and it could not carry-more and empty into the Strand as it does at present. We are faced with the question of whether another bridge at
that point will relieve the traffic and enable us to get six lines of traffic across the river at that point. We have evidence that that is an impossibility. You cannot get six lines of traffic into the Strand as it is at present. The question of cost is more important, because the new bridge will be an extraordinarily expensive one and a very useless one.
My main point, and the point that this House will consider, is the question of the cross-river traffic of London in general, and I do not think that any hon. Member will deny that the proper thing to do is to build a bridge at Charing Cross. Charing Cross gives us an entry into London to the clear, open space of Trafalgar Square and all those great roads leading out of London. This will be a very expensive bridge, and consequently we cannot afford it if in its place we build a new bridge at Waterloo. We have also to remember that if we pull down the existing bridge we shall incur terrible delay and expense over the demolition and clearing away of the material in addition to building the new bridge. If we build the new bridge, it will postpone the great bridge at Charing Cross for at least a century.
What we have to decide to-night is whether there is any evidence before the House that the question we are deciding is not the question we decided two years ago. If we go back on the decision to which we came two years ago we shall make ourselves ridiculous, for we are asked by a Socialist county council to do what we refused to a Conservative county council. I do not want to make any party points, but I can see no reason for granting to a new county council of a different complexion what we refused to ourselves here. As no new evidence has been brought, the House will be very foolish to go back on its decision of two years ago.
Before I sit down I should like to put one great point before the House; it has already been put many times, but I will put it again. There is no question that the Port of London Authority are now in favour of pulling down Waterloo Bridge and building a new bridge at the same point, because the new piers will be a little broader and there will be some greater ease—that is all that can be said—in passing traffic under the new bridge than there has been under
the old. We have, however, already had the evidence of the Port of London Authority that the old bridge has been adequate for passing the traffic through during the whole of the last century and that there has never been an accident at that point. There is no reason to presume for one moment that the new bridge will make the passage of traffic any easier. I want the House to note that to pass traffic through the new bridge, which is to be a bridge for six lines of road traffic and therefore far wider than the present bridge, with a narrower arch, is dot necessarily going to be any easier.
Evidence has been given by no less an authority than Lord Ritchie that there is no reason why this present bridge should not continue to take the traffic as it has done in the past. It is admitted that a wider arch may make it a little easier for the people who will use it, but is that a reason for desiring this bridge and for spending a colossal sum of money in getting a new bridge which will not serve the public of London? I venture to think that the House will not go back upon its decision. In the interests of the public of this great city, in the interests of the traffic of this great city, we should recondition the present bridge and leave it for four lines of traffic, because that is all we can get into the Strand, with any facility. I certainly look forward at a later date to the building of that great bridge which London wants and demands at Charing Cross, which will take the whole of the traffic across into the only open space we have, feeding all these main roads in and out of London and leaving that monument which we all admire and love so much. The old bridge, reconditioned, will last 100 years, and I therefore support the Motion.

9.34 p.m.

The MINISTER of TRANSPORT (Mr. Oliver Stanley): I do not wish to go over the past history of this case. It is well within the recollection of all hon. Members of the House. I should, however, like to state quite briefly how its past history has affected, and how the present decision may affect, the particular position of the Minister of Transport. It is, of course, true that the decision which the House took on 1st June, 1932, did not, technically, deal with the Road Fund
grant. It operated only as a ban upon borrowing by the London County Council but my predecessor at the time accepted that resolution as an indication of the feelings and desires of this House and felt himself precluded by it from giving any grant for a scheme which involved the restruction of Waterloo Bridge, even if the London County Council would be able by other financial methods to raise their share. I, of course, feel myself under the same obligation to this House and I so informed Mr. Morrison when, soon after the county council election, he raised the matter anew. If to-night the House alters the decision which it took two years ago, I shall regard that ban as removed. I shall regard myself then as being in a position to offer a grant for a new Waterloo Bridge. As the hon. Member for East Fulham (Mr. Wilmot) explained, the London County Council itself has not decided and is not tied to any particular bridge. Therefore, my discretion is not in any way fettered nor am I in any way committed.
There are, however, two considerations which have to be remembered. The first is that, from the point of view of its architectural merit, any scheme for a new bridge, before I consider it for a Road Fund grant, would have to receive the approval of the Fine Art Commission. The second is this. The discussions between my predecessor and the London County Council of the time proceeded upon the basis of a new bridge which would cost something in the neighbourhood of £1,300,000. If I were asked to accept a scheme for a new bridge at a cost which would exceed substantially the basis upon which my predecessor discussed the matter and upon which he gave a tentative approval, I should have to consider the whole position again. As upon the previous occasion, so to-night the decision upon this matter is left entirely to the free vote of the House and I informed Mr. Morrison that the Government would adopt that position. In fact, I doubt whether I, as a Member of the Government, should have to-night intervened upon a Private Bill, left to the free vote of the House, were it not for the fact that some aspects of this problem touch very closely matters connected with my Department and I think the House is entitled to expect that I should give them upon those aspects
whatever information is in possession of my Department and of whatever advice is tendered by my experts.
There are many factors which will go to make, in the minds of hon. Members, a final decision and on many of them I am afraid I can offer the House no guidance. We have heard a great deal about the artistic factor. I must confess at once that not only do I know nothing about art, but I do not even know what I like until I am told by the right person. I, certainly, should not presume to advise the House upon that factor. Even my untutored eye can, of course, recognise the beauty, the strength, the simplicity of the existing bridge but other and greater experts must advise hon. Members as to the exact place which that bridge is to take in the hierarchy of beauty, the exact extent of the loss we should suffer by its demolition and how far the work of an artist of 100 years ago is to be regarded as completely irreplaceable to-day.
Another factor to which our attention has been drawn has been the historical memorial factor. There too I am afraid I am in no position to advise the House. Alone, I expect, among all hon. Members in this House I must confess that until two years ago when this controversy started in the Press, I had no idea whatever that Waterloo Bridge had any intimate connection with Waterloo any more than Waterloo Place or Waterloo Junction. I agree that those are considerations to which everybody is entitled to give the greatest weight and I am not for a moment going to depreciate the efforts of those who attempt to save what is beautiful in this country from almost inevitable destruction by a mechanical progress. Perhaps in many walks of life it would be just as well if a little more often instead of asking "is it cheaper" or "is it more convenient," we asked "is it more beautiful." We might by doing so, be able to restrict the harm arising from the new mechanical life which we are called upon to live. But, important as those considerations are, I suggest that ultimately the test of a bridge must be its suitability for the purpose for which it was built.
We have had raised to-night the question of navigation. The Port of London Authority and the river users have put forward their case with great emphasis
and have proved, I think, conclusively a fact which I also think no one would deny, that for their purposes a five-arched bridge is more convenient than an eight-arched one, just as no bridge at all would be more convenient still. I do not think that fact can be disputed on any side of the House, but it is, of course, for hon. Members to decide on the balance of advantage as between the five-arched bridge and the eight-arched bridge, and whether the advantage which undoubtedly the river users would get from the five-arched bridge would compensate for any disadvantages which there might be upon other grounds. The real factor with which I am concerned, however, is the traffic factor, and I venture to say that, as regards a bridge, the traffic which it is going to carry and the traffic which it ought to carry represent the most important consideration of all. I do not say that the traffic advantages of a six-line bridge as opposed to a four-line bridge ought necessarily to outweigh any other disadvantages which such a bridge might have, but I do say that those traffic advantages are such that they are worthy of the very serious consideration of the House.
Two questions have been raised, with regard to the proposal for a new six-line bridge, from the purely traffic point of view. The first is, whether a six-line bridge is really needed. The second is whether, granted you have a six-line bridge, you can deal with the six lines of traffic at either end of the bridge. With regard to the first question, the need for a six-line bridge, I say frankly that on the basis of the present traffic I could not suggest to the House that a six-line bridge was a necessity. It would undoubtedly be an advantage. It would be an advantage from this point of view, that at the present moment the capacity of all those bridges—Westminster, Waterloo, Blackfriars and London Bridge —is occupied to the full. There is practically no reserve, and if you had some serious defect appearing in one of the other bridges, there would be no reserve capacity upon any of the others which could absorb the deflected traffic, and it would obviously, from the traffic point of view, be a great advantage if you did have, even on the basis of present traffic, a certain reserve capacity which you could use to take up any unexpected strain
thrown by the partial or complete closing of a particular bridge. But I am not sure that when we are talking about the building of a bridge which is going to last, not five or 10, but, to judge from the bridge we are now discussing, over 100 years, we can be quite satisfied with discussing the traffic needs of the moment. I admit that here, of course, I pass from the realms of fact, in which I ask the House to attach some weight to what I am able to say, with the authority of my Department, into the realms of conjecture, where we all stand on an equality and where we all have to make up our minds for ourselves.
But I would ask the House, even if it is true that on the basis of to-day's traffic a four-line bridge would be ample to accommodate it, to consider whether it would be entirely wise to forget the possibilities of expansion in the future. We have had a remarkable history of expansion and development in the London area in the past few years. We have seen, in the years since the War, an amazing growth of vehicular traffic, and if we are just planning for the generations ahead, the House, I think, must seriously consider whether it is wise to limit our resources entirely to our immediate needs and leave no room whatsoever for possible expansion. There is one particular point which I think adds to the necessity for careful consideration of the possibilities.
I think it was my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge University (Sir J. Withers) who, when he was discussing Waterloo Bridge, said that there was practically no exit to the north. That is quite true, but hon. Members know the reason for that. It is that due north of Waterloo Bridge lies the Covent Garden area, and no driver of a motor vehicle in his senses is going, if he can possibly avoid it, to take his motor in the hours of daylight into the Covent Garden area and risk the congestion which inevitably occurs there. But I wonder whether we may assume that Covent Garden is going to continue in its present form during the whole life of this reconstructed bridge, and whether, in the days to come, if the Covent Garden area were to be reconstructed, instead of on the northern exit from Waterloo Bridge the motorists were faced with a well planned area, with a large street running through it, rather than the present congested small streets
round the market, we should not then see an immense increase in the traffic which is now passing through that area.
The other point raised is the ability to deal with six lines of traffic, if we have a bridge built to carry it. Here, of course, I venture to speak with rather more certainty, because we are dealing not so much with assumptions as with facts for which my experts can vouch. I think it is undoubted that the roundabout system which has been introduced has immensely decreased the congestion which previously occurred in the Strand. One hon. Member spoke with some feeling about delays of eight or nine minutes which he has experienced there. I think he must have been very unlucky, because in the past two years my officers have taken a great many tests of the traffic at that particular point, and I am informed that they have not get on record any ease of a hold-up of longer than from one minute to two minutes.

Sir W. DAVISON: Oh!

Mr. STANLEY: My hon. Friend must remember that one's judgment of time when one is in a traffic block is rather like one's judgment of time when one is listening either to a speech with which one disagrees or to a speech from a chronic bore. But I do not think anyone who knew the Strand before the introduction of this round-about system and who knows it now will deny the immense improvement that has been made in the matter of traffic acceleration. I believe that even on the existing system we have a reserve capacity at the Strand entrance for more traffic crossing the bridge; but there are further possibilities by which I think we can increase the passage of the traffic into and over the Strand if we have to take it from the bridge. First of all, there are light signals. Undoubtedly, where they have been tried in London, they have produced a considerable acceleration of the traffic, and the possibility is that their installation at that spot would in itself provide us with a further acceleration.
There is, secondly, the fact that the six-line bridge, and therefore the six-line approach from the bridge to the Strand, would by itself facilitate traffic. It would, of course, prevent the hold-up which you now get in the one line between the
corner of the Strand and the bridge itself, which banks back into the Strand and creates a hold-up there. If that traffic turning out of the Strand to cross the bridge were proceeding in three lines, not one line, you would, of course, avoid that possibility, but equally you would have a very definite advantage upon the other side, that is to say, for the traffic going North. The traffic going North, when it reaches the Strand, can go in one of two directions. It can either turn West down the Strand, or it can go half-right up Aldwych, and at the present moment vehicles do that in the proportion of about one down the Strand, West, to two which go up Aldwydh. Owing to the fact that you are confined to one line of traffic, all those vehicles are mixed indiscriminately from the time they leave the bridge till the time they reach the corner of the Strand and separate on their various ways. If you had, instead of the one line, three lines by which they could approach the Strand, you could reserve the one nearest the pavement for the traffic turning into the Strand, and you could reserve the other two for the traffic, which works out at about exactly twice as much, into Aldwych, and that in itself would, I think, immensely accelerate the traffic capacity.
Finally, there is this further potentiality. If you were faced with any sudden and great increase of traffic over the bridge, the possibility of a subway still remains. My hon. Friend has no foundation whatsoever when he says that that possibility has been found impracticable. I imagine that he took it from the leader in the "Times" this morning. There is no other foundation for it whatever. When the tramway subway was constructed provision was made to allow for this possibility, and, as far as I am aware, no practical doubt has ever been cast on the possibility of making such a subway if the traffic demands be such as to make it desirable. I can therefore say with some confidence that, if there were a need for six lines of traffic across Waterloo Bridge, we could deal with them in comparative simplicity when they debouched at either end.
I would like to say one word about Charing Cross. Here, too, we are in the realm not of fact but of conjecture. I think, perhaps, that some hon. Members
may be inclined to forget the distinction between Charing Cross Bridge and the Charing Cross Bridge scheme. The Charing Cross Bridge, as I see it, and as I have heard it described to-night, certainly conveys to me something which starts from a place where no one wants to be and goes to a place where no one wants to go; but the Charing Cross Bridge, as part of the scheme which has as its aim not merely the provision of one more traffic link but the replanning of a district of South London which ought to be one of the best features in our London life and which is in fact one of the worst, is a scheme which I think must fire the imagination of everyone. The possibility of seeing the Embankment on the South side in line with the Embankment on the North, the possibility of seeing the architecture on the south as impressive as that on the north is one which I think must appeal to all of us. Do not forget, however, what the effect of that may be upon the traffic problem. If you create in this part of the south of London a residential area of the same class as that north of the river, a business area as prosperous as that north of the river and perhaps a hotel and shopping area of the same category, then you will create a community of interests between the north and the south of the river, and in doing so you may well create a greater cross-river traffic than you have to-day. It might well be that the development of south London and the putting into force of the Charing Cross Bridge scheme would in itself lead to such an increase of cross-river traffic that you would find the six-line bridge at Waterloo not wasted even though you had the bridge at Charing Cross.
My task this evening has not been an easy one. I do not disguise the fact that I voted on the last occasion for the new bridge and that I intend to vote for it again this evening, but I have tried as far as possible to put before the House the considerations which are peculiarly applicable to my Department in as judicial a manner as possible. I feel that it is all the more necessary because we have upon this occasion imposed a strict quota system upon the Front Bench and I am the only speaker from it to-night, and my hon. Friends will be deprived of the support of my hon. Friend the Member for St. George's (Mr. Cooper), whose
eloquent speech on the last occasion all of us, even those who disagreed with him, remember with admiration. I said I have tried, if I could, to put the facts in a judicial way. If I have failed, I apologise to the House and I ask them to forget anything in my speech which has been at all partisan in character and to remember only such facts as I have been able to give which may be useful to them in coming to a decision.
In conclusion, may I give the House two pieces of advice, both of which, I believe, are unnecessary and unwanted. So often when the House has to come to a decision upon a Measure, however important it may be, we have the comforting sense that in a way it is experimental and that, even if the decision we take be wrong, we can put it right very quickly at the expense of nothing more perhaps than a little delay and a little Parliamentary time. About the decision which the House has to take to-night, however, there is a terrible finality. If we pull down Waterloo Bridge, and we are wrong in pulling it down, we can never put it back again. Just the same, if we are wrong and we keep Waterloo Bridge when we ought to have built the new bridge, it will be years before we are in a position once again to consider the matter, and we shall have caused inconvenience to traffic for years. Therefore, I appeal to the House from that point of view to take a decision to-night upon the most closely reasoned grounds. The second piece of advice, which I think is unnecessary—for the hon. Member for Richmond (Sir W. Ray) made such a completely unbiased, unpolitical and non-partisan speech—is that no political considerations should enter into the decision of the House to-night. We are dealing one way or the other with the convenience and amenities of London, and I am sure there is no Member of the House who would like to think that a decision so important as this was dependent on party political feelings. The decision of the House, difficult as it is bound to be, must be reasoned and impartial.

10.4 p.m.

Sir JOHN SANDEMAN ALLEN: I am sure the House is grateful for the very judicial and balanced speech which we have just heard from the Front Bench. I am one of those, and I think there is a
fair number here, who voted against any change being made two years ago, and I propose to vote against the Instruction proposed by the hon. Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison). In doing so I do not consider I am reversing my decision in any way. I think it is not right to suggest that the House is reversing its decision if it agrees to the proposal in the Bill. The majority of us voted as we did on the last occasion solely on the grounds of the financial position of the country at the moment. We thought then that economy had to be foremost, and we could not support a heavy expenditure of money. Things are different to-day. Moreover, we have had more information on this subject. Some of us have been able to study closely the pros and cons in a way we could not before. Therefore, it would be wrong to suggest that the House took its decision on the merits of the case two years ago. We have had the point argued very carefully from both sides with regard to road traffic, and it has also been dealt with by the best authority in the House, the Minister of Transport. He has made it perfectly clear that the fears entertained by a good many hon. Members about traffic blocks and traffic jams are unfounded and that the position is not feared by those who are responsible for the ordering of the traffic of this great city.

The question of navigation has not been fully dealt with, although it was referred to by the hon. Member for Dartford (Mr. Clarke). We have to look at this matter from a broad and general point of view. We have to recognise the growing importance of river and water-borne traffic in this country, and particularly in London. If we were to transfer carriage from barges to lorries we should have the whole of the roads going in and out of London completely congested. The cost of carriage of coal, oil and refuse would be doubled and trebled if it went by road. To suggest that we should not have a six lighters tow is perfectly ridiculous. I would ask the House to remember the increase in the number of trucks put into a goods train to-day for economy purposes. The only economical way of dealing with barges is to have six in tow, and to suggest that we should give that up is absurd.

One reason why we should consider how important it is that a change should be made in regard to Waterloo Bridge is that the river traffic is growing, and it is very vital to the interests of the Thames and of London. We cannot measure how much that traffic has been hindered by the difficulties of the past. The House must look not upon what has happened in the past but the position at the present time and the serious position in the future if we are going to maintain a bridge which is of the greatest danger and the greatest hindrance to navigation. Apart from these matters, the question can be easily disposed of. We have been assured that there is no real danger in regard to road traffic. We can see that the proposed change will make a very great improvement and will give better opportunities for traffic by water. Therefore, in supporting the proposal for the new bridge we are doing what is best for the future and what is best for trade. We have to weigh the practical question of the great advantage to the people and the City of London and to compare that with what we shall undoubtedly lose in regard to the beauty of a particular bridge. I will not say anything about the speech made by the hon. Member for Richmond (Sir W. Ray), and the psychological impression that he made on the House.

Two years ago objection was taken that Members from the country should speak and vote on a London Measure. As a Member from another city, I feel it is my duty to speak and vote on this matter, because the Road Fund is a general fund for everybody. I do not see why London should not have its proper share, although some of us in other parts have small or large shares, as the case may be. The House must not be prejudiced. We must do what is fair and right in the interests of the city and the country as a whole. The city is the centre of the business of the country, and I feel confident that this House, having heard both sides, will decide that, much as we regret what we must lose; we must take a step forward in the general interests of the community.

10.11 p.m.

Commander MARSDEN: I welcome this opportunity to emphasise the case for the river users, which was very ably put by the hon. Member for Dartford
(Mr. Clarke). The testimony that he gave to the House is worth all the opinions given by other hon. Members who have no practical experience. I have some little experience of river traffic. I spent 10 very happy days in 1926 towing barges through the Very bridge about which we are talking, during the general strike. I should like hon. Members to bring their minds back to the evidence given by Lord Ritchie, on behalf of the Port of London Authority. That evidence was given seven years ago when traffic on the river was very different from what it is to-day. There has been a tremendous increase in the volume of petrol traffic in tanks going up the river. Each of the barges conveying this inflammable freight under Waterloo Bridge carries 180 tons. There may not have been any accidents yet but there have been quite sufficient unpleasant episodes in navigation to make one rather afraid of what would happen if any of these barges were to get into collision with another craft.
We have heard a good deal about the asthetic qualities of the bridge. That question has been dealt with by the Minister of Transport. As a sailor, I might say that we appreciate the beautiful but when a man in navigating a ship on a nasty night, with a strong tide and a cross wind, and he cannot see what is on the other side of a bridge, he does not care whether it is a Conservative bridge or a Socialist bridge, but what he does want to see is an open passage where he can navigate his craft with safety. The hon. Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison) was rather upset at one barge towing six lighters. Those lighters carry 1,200 tons. During the general strike I was very much struck by the fact that when the lorries were coming down to the various wharves, surrounded by armed troops or armoured cars, it took a tug with eight volunteers to convey 1,000 to 1,200 tons of cargo. The river was used for traffic before roads were invented. A great volume of traffic was carried up and down the river before a single bridge was put across the river, and yet one hon. Member suggested that, having put these impediments in the way of navigation, the navigation should pay for their removal, an argument with which I did not find myself in accord.
Two years ago the case for the navigation side was not put at all. [HON.
MEMBERS: "Why not!"] I did not catch Mr. Speaker's eye. The evidence given before the Royal Commission has been freely quoted by the hon. Member for South Kensington, and we have been reminded of what Lord Ritchie said at that time, but what does Lord Ritchie say now as representing the Port of London Authority, which is the body responsible not only for the safe conduct of the river but for increasing and making easier the facilities for navigation? The opinion of the Port of London Authority is that the present bridge should be pulled down and a more satisfactory one put in its place.
I will say one word about the traffic over the bridge. The Minister put clearly what so many of us have thought about the six-line traffic when he told us that we must consider not only present needs but the possible needs of the future. I would add that it may not be necessary to have the whole six lines now. Many of the big new roads in the country have spaces at each side of them to enable widening to be undertaken if that should be necessary in the years to come. I would suggest that in the ease of this bridge the pavements on each side might give a six-line traffic for pedestrians, which in itself would facilitate traffic slightly. Referring again to the aesthetic aspect of the question, I wonder whether the aesthetic experts stick to the old winding narrow road in order to pass through some picturesque village or town and admire the beauties of the scene or choose the broad and rather possibly ugly by-pass which goes round? Where traffic is concerned it is often a question of men's livelihood, because they earn their living by the transport of goods. These are the chief considerations on which I shall have no difficulty in making up my mind to go into the Lobby and vote to give the London County Council authority to build a new bridge if they wish to do so.

10.16 p.m.

Mr. JOHN JONES: As a representative of a division which is not connected with the London County Council but which is a riverside constituency I am here to support the London County Council in this effort. We have heard some fine language to-night about the beauty of Waterloo Bridge, but you ought to hear the language of the tugboat men, the watermen and the lighter-men in my constituency when they
approach Waterloo Bridge. It is more forcible than descriptive. It may not be recorded in history, but it is recorded in the memory of the men who have to work on the river day after day and night after night. Some people fail to realise that the traffic on the river is becoming more and more important as the days go by. We have on the riverside a great station for supplying electricity for the underground railways, and there are big gas works to provide gas for the West End of London, although, no doubt, the hon. Member for South Kensington (Sir W. Davison) could provide it with all the gas wanted. The men in the East End of London who come up the river from Purfleet bringing commodities for the use of the inhabitants of London are in favour of a new bridge and against the reconditioning of the old bridge, because they feel this would make it more difficult than ever for them to carry on with their jobs. I wonder what the hon. Member for South Kensington would think if he got up one morning and found that he could not have his breakfast because the electricity supply had failed or the gas had "gone west." He would talk as he did on the barrack squares in the old days when he was a general.
I am speaking now for the men living in the East End of London who get their living on the river. In spite of all that has been said about the beauty of Waterloo Bridge, there are more beauties in the West End of London than ever there were. It is not beyond the reach of possibility for architects and artists to provide us with just as good a bridge as did the old artists. Is art dead? Is scientific knowledge finished? I have seen statues in ferro-concrete that were more beautiful than some of the Members of this House.
All this talk about the aesthetic qualities of Waterloo Bridge leaves me cold. I want to see a bridge that will be useful to the public. You can have all the beauties you like on top of the bridge, but let us have decency underneath, so that the men who get their living on the river will not be impeded by ancient monuments or be prevented because, 100 years ago, somebody did something which he ought not to have done. Waterloo does not trouble me a
bit. Over 100 years ago we had a fight at Waterloo; we have had another since, and those who were our allies at that time were our enemies on the next occasion. Can we not forget Waterloo and remember London? Can we not remember that we are living in a country which has something to talk about? The needs of its people are the country's greatest problem; not the preservation of an old bridge, but the preservation of the life of the people.

10.22 p.m.

Mr. SIMMONDS: If I understood my hon. Friend the Minister of Transport aright, in his inimitable balanced speech he introduced a fallacious innuendo. I had decided to vote in favour of this Instruction, but as I listened to my hon. Friend's suggestion that if he could avoid the banking of traffic on the northerly bridge-head between Somerset House and the Strand, that would be a very great asset, I began to wonder whether I was still correct in supporting this Instruction. I was mesmerised only for a few moments, because it came to me quite clearly that my hon. Friend was not at all right in connecting a six-line roadway just south of the Strand with a six-line bridge. The bridge can very easily remain a four-line bridge, and when you get on to the bridge-head, past Somerset House and between Somerset House and the Strand, you can widen out in order, as my hon. Friend pointed out, that a longer line of traffic could go down the Strand, and the other two lines could go down Aldwych. I trust that any hon. Member who felt, as I did, that the argument of the Minister was a very cogent one, will agree that it is by no means essential, if we are to have six lines immediately south of the Strand, to pull down Waterloo Bridge. On the contrary a four-line bridge could continue to pour out enough traffic to block the Strand, never mind the question of the traffic proceeding east and west.

10.24 p.m.

Sir GEORGE HUME: After the most admirable speech of the hon. Member for East Fulham (Mr. Wilmot), who put the council's case completely and eloquently, there is no need for me to detain the House. The riverside problem has already been dealt with, and the Minister of Transport has once more put the traffic case completely. I should like to deal
with the atmospherics of the case. I am taking part in this Debate upon the proposals put forward by the London County Council because it is essential to let the House realise that this is not merely a party question. I have been connected with the council for a long time, dealing with municipal affairs, and the longer I have done so the more sure I have become that when politics get mixed up with administrative matters, commonsense goes out of the window. I hope that the House on this occasion will not allow itself to be led astray by any political suggestions which may enter into the minds of Members or which may have been made.
The London County Council in this matter has been an extremely patient and long-suffering body. It was in 1923 that the bridge first showed signs of collapse. The London County Council did not take that matter lightly. They called to their assistance practically at once, not merely their own chief engineer, Sir George Humphreys, but also two other eminent engineers, the best they could lay their hands on—Sir Basil Mott and Sir Maurice Fitzmaurice, who had been chief engineer to the council and was well acquainted with the bridges that the council owned. They went into this matter, not as a political matter at all, but purely as a matter of fact, from an engineering point of view, and the advice which they gave to the London County Council at that time was most emphatic. It was that it was not advisable to try to patch up or reconstruct the existing bridge, but that it was advisable to pull it down completely.
The Council proceeded to follow that advice. In 1925 they decided to rebuild the bridge with six lines of traffic and five arches, and that was included in the London County Council (Money) Bill of 1926. Then the difficulties began to arise. Artistic feeling was extremely excited by the suggestion, and, as the House will know, a very infiuentially signed memorial was submitted to the Prime Minister. As a result the Royal Commission was set up to go into the whole question. The Council at once held its hand and did not go forward. The Royal Commission was appointed in July, 1926, and made its report in November of the same year. Then the Council bowed to the decision which was come to against its better judgment, and in 1927 decided to adopt the scheme on the basis of a 75 per cent.
contribution from the Ministry of Transport, on the consideration that a bridge at Charing Cross would be proceeded with on the same basis as that on which Waterloo Bridge was to be dealt with. In 1929–30 the London County Council presented a Bill to incorporate in the scheme that of the Ministry of Transport for a Charing Cross Bridge and approaches. That scheme also was killed in a Select Committee of the House of Commons. I have not the slightest doubt that every one of us deeply regrets that the opportunity was not then taken which appears to us now so unlikely to recur.
In any case, the Council did its very best, and, when that Bill was destroyed, instead of letting the matter drop, it invited its critics and those who had made alternative proposals to join the Committee in order to see if a new scheme could be evolved. A new scheme was evolved and another Bill was prepared. Then, unfortunately, we came to that period when, in 1931, economy had to be practised and the present leader of the London County Council, who was then a most capable Minister of Transport, had to refuse to join in the enterprise for building a new bridge, and the scheme had to be dropped. Right through those years the council has been twisted and turned and upset in one direction and another until we came to the House once more two years ago and, although we had the good will of the Ministry of Transport, we were met with opposition again. I would remind the House of the nature of that opposition. We had behind us the considered opinion of some of the most eminent engineers. Throughout, from a technical point of view, the line that the council had taken was not shaken. As far as traffic was concerned, the Advisory Committee to the Ministry of Transport had reported in favour of a six-line bridge. Every responsible authority had supported it, but the House was carried away by all sorts of amateur figures which were thrown across the Floor and by the opinions of, it may be, very distinguished volunteers who said the thing could be done this way or that way for less money or in a shorter time.
To-day we are in a different position. We have actually before us fixed offers by reputable firms of the price at which they can carry out the work and the time that it will take. We have heard stories about the immense amount of time that a
completely new bridge would take to build and have been told that the reconditioning of the present bridge would take much less time and cost much less money. We now know, from the tenders that have been received, that the reconditioning will probably take longer than building a new bridge. A new bridge will cost more but, on the other hand, when you are considering the question of cost you have to consider at the same time how long the structure is going to last. It is well worth paying twice the amount if you are going to get three times the life. We have not heard a word to-night as to the period in which it is estimated that a reconstructed bridge would be likely to last. [Interruption.] It has never been suggested that you were going to reconstruct for a very long period. It is no use putting forward amateurish suggestions. We have to go on the advice tendered to us by our responsible technical people.
I only hope that to-night the House will not once more step in and try to prevent the London County Council carrying out the work on lines upon which for years it has been thought were the right lines to adopt, even though there is a change of management and some of us might be tempted to take a contrary view to that of the new management of the London County Council. But some of us think that these questions affecting London life and well-being are far more important than the question of political tactics, and it is of vital importance that we should satisfy our own consciences no matter what advantage might be claimed by any political party. That is our bounden duty, in view of the opinions which we hold, the advice which has been given to us, the struggles which we have made through those years to try to meet the difficulties which have been raised, and as a Charing Cross bridge seems to have departed for the time being, and the fact that, right away from the beginning, we said that it was essential to have six lines unless we were to get a Charing Cross bridge. We still stand there. The majority of the council, quite apart from parties, stand to-day where they stood before, and it is on that ground that I hope the House will not pass the Instruction which has been moved.

10.37 p.m.

Mr. W. MORRISON: I join with the hon. Member for Greenwich (Sir G. Hume)
in hoping, and, indeed, believing confidently that this important question will not be decided with reference to any consideration other than the merits of the case with which we are confronted. I, for one, would deprecate, as most hon. Members would, I am sure, any attempt to consider the matter on political party lines. I am reinforced, if it is necessary, in that view by the great diffidence I feel in regard to my capabilities in following the tortuous maze of London County Council politics. It appears to me that it is a matter devoid of political significance in the ordinary party sense, because it is only two years since we had the same proposal put up by an opposite party in the London County Council. We came to a decision upon it then, and now to-night we are asked to reverse that decision. I feel sorry that we have to interfere at all with the arrangements made by the London County Council for the good government of this city. It would be an easier task for us if we had not to interfere in any way with the decisions arrived at by that well-informed and public-spirited body, but that is no excuse for us to-night shirking what is our duty, namely, to discharge the function of saying whether or not this proposal is to go forward in its present state. If anything were needed to add to the necessity of our examination of this proposal, it is the fact that, as far as the matter stands at present, about 60 per cent. of the cost of the proposed bridge is to come out of public funds for which we are all responsible.
It was with some surprise that I found this question cropping up again upon the Order Paper after the House had, after a full discussion a short time ago, by a very emphatic majority, come to a conclusion which it is now asked to reverse. I could have understood it if there had been before us to-night any new factor which had altered the decision we were asked to consider. What is the main consideration put before hon. Members tonight by those who oppose this instruction? It is the question of navigation. It is said that on the previous occasion when we had this matter under consideration the navigational aspects of this question were not properly considered, and that that is a reason, when we are considering them for the first time, for
reversing the decision to which we previously came. At least we can say this, that after the full and admirable Debate we have had to-night that complaint can no longer be made.
We have had the navigable aspect of the problem put before us in terms of the utmost eloquence by hon. Members including the hon. Member for Dartford (Mr. Clarke) and the hon. Member for North Battersea (Commander Marsden). But is it right to say that the navigable aspect of the question was not within the contemplation of the House on the last occasion? What are we told now about the problem of navigation? We have been told to-night that if we had wider arches to the bridge it would make it easier for ships to go under. Is that a fact of such a recondite description that it was not within the contemplation of every hon. Member when the matter was last under discussion? I cannot accept the view that the navigable aspect of the problem was not considered by every hon. Member. Let us examine what has been put forward to-night on the matter. We are told by the Port of London Authority in a statement which they have issued, and in words which they have thought of sufficient importance to print in red instead of black:
The Port Authority submit that in considering the form of construction of any bridge that the question of river navigation consideration should outweigh all others.
If we are to say that a certain consideration must outweigh all others our task would be a great deal easier than it is. It is natural for the Port of London Authority to take that view. They are a very important and admirable body discharging specialist functions, and it is only to be expected that in their view the maintenance of the waterway of the Thames should outweigh all others, and that the House must give its decision on that footing. We are familiar with specialist pleas in this House. I have no doubt that if there were in existence a body whose duty it was to look after the interests of pavement artists we should be asked, in allowing one consideration to outweigh all others, to consider that the new bridge should provide sufficient suitable pitches and well glazed pavements for the exercise of that profession. I am not saying that
the navigation question is not one of the most important aspects of the case, but what are the facts regarding navigation? Even if we assume that navigation is the only question to be considered, that we are to provide a commodious and safe waterway, without regard to expense or existing amenities, or its effects on cross river traffic, I submit that those who have supported the Bill have not made out the point of view put forward in the Port of London Authority's statement.
Any bridge, if you like, is an obstacle and is bound to be so. In order to get through it requires skill on the part of the navigator. But the case against the present Waterloo Bridge must go as far as this. It is no use saying it is an obstacle, every bridge is an obstacle, the case for the present Bill must assert either that it is an obstacle of such a character that reasonable skill cannot surmount it in safety, or that it is an obstacle of such a character that it is bound to impede, definitely and permanently, the economic development of the river. Unless the assertion of the effect of the bridge upon the navigational aspect goes that distance, it goes no distance at all.
From the point of view of safety reference has been made to the evidence given by Lord Ritchie to the Commission. I do not wish in any way to make any use of that evidence which was not in the contemplation of the Noble Lord when he gave his evidence; but it is quite clear that figures were put to him on that occasion, that between 1921 and 1924, when the bridge was first blocked by its present supports under the arches, there was no accident of any kind to life or limb or cargo or craft. It does not appear to me that those figures are in themselves conclusive, that there will be no obstacle in the bridge, if it is reconstructed, in its arches, which reasonable skill, the skill to which the hon. Member for Dartford paid such a glowing tribute, would not be able successfully to surmount.
But the question goes a little deeper than that. The bridge that it is proposed to construct is to be wider than the present bridge, and that has the effect of lengthening the tunnel formed by the arch through which the boats must pass. From the navigational aspect that is of the highest importance. Let me refer again for a moment to the evidence given
by Lord Ritchie before the Commission. It will be seen from that, when he was pleading for consultation of the Port of London Authority on every bridge building proposal that was made, that what he had in mind was not the question of the number or the narrowness of arches, but that the bogy from the navigational aspect was the length of the tunnel through which a boat had to pass. These were his words:
Lord RITCHIE: That brings me to say this, if I may: Amongst the other proposals or suggestions that have been made was one that the bridge should be widened. Now, I have always understood that Waterloo Bridge in its present condition is the great test of a waterman's art. It is easy to imagine how the difficulties of navigating the bridge would be accentuated if it was increased in width.

The CHAIRMAN: In tunnel width, you mean?

Lord RITCHIE: Yes, in tunnel width. So that if any suggestion of that kind were made, of course the Port of London Authority would have a good deal to say." To-night it is not merely a question of contrasting a narrow arch with a wide arch, but a question of setting against the undoubted advantage of a wide arch the disadvantage of a longer tunnel. From the navigational point of view, I respectfully suggest that that is a matter which ought to be brought before us. The other point of view is that Waterloo Bridge with its present arches is a danger to navigation—not in the sense of danger to life and limb, for, as has been, said, there have been no accidents for three years—and is so formed that it is a check to the economic development of the river higher up. Let any hon. Member look at the statements that have been showered upon him in favour of the Bill. They one and all join in a paean of praise over the immense development of river traffic in recent years, how it has grown by leaps and bounds. Let the House remember that is has grown so by leaps and bounds in recent years with the bridge in its present condition, with the two main arches blocked. If indeed that great increase in river traffic be a fact —there is no cause to deny it—it has taken place not only with the bridge as it will be when reconstructed, but with the bridge with its two chief arches blocked permanently by wooden structures.
There is nothing in these facts that Suggests for one moment that a reconstructed
bridge with its arches open again would not provide ample accommodation for all reasonable developments of river craft and would not hold out for tie future an ample hope of coping successfully with any stream of traffic that human foresight can imagine going up and down the river. I suggest, therefore, for these reasons that those who oppose this reconstruction have failed to show that the arches of the bridge in its present form would, if reconstructed, be a danger to navigation. The contrary is proved by three year's navigation without accident of any kind. The opponents of reconstruction have failed to prove that the bridge would be a hindrance to the economic development of the river, because even in its mutilated and truncated present condition it has permitted, as the opponents of reconstruction themselves say, an immense development of river traffic.
Something has also been said about large boats. We are told that if the bridge be left in its present form with regard to arches there will be difficulty in developing the larger river craft which will be capable of sea-going voyages. For my part, I do not think that that would be any great loss. Even if it were true, Waterloo Bridge is ten feet higher than Westminster Bridge, and if a boat can go under Westminster Bridge it can go under Waterloo Bridge. Nevertheless, I believe that we are here in danger of falling into an error. The river traffic depends in the last resort not upon the big boat but upon a vast number of small boats, manned by our own watermen. By retaining Waterloo Bridge in its present condition we shall be preserving the livelihood—the monopoly if you like—of those who ply up and down the river in small craft at the present moment and have done so from time immemorial. On that aspect of the matter, I would suggest to the House that, if that be a now point on which we are to make a decision, it is entirely without foundation. The experience of three years has shown that the skill of our native watermen is quite sufficient to cope in absolute safety with the bridge in its original condition. The immense increase of traffic even when the bridge has been blocked up shows that, when it is open, it will be no hindrance to the economic development of the river.
I come to a point which must be one of great importance from the navigational
point of view. Whatever you do in this matter of the bridge, whether you reconstruct the present bridge or pull it down and erect a new one, there is bound to be some interruption both of cross-river and of river traffic. We ordinary Members are in difficulty on those matters because we have to be guided very largely by what we are told of estimates, the time it will take, and so on. I cannot, however, conceive it possible that the reconstruction of the present bridge in the manner suggested could possibly mean such a prolonged interruption, both to river traffic and to cross-river traffic, as would be involved in pulling down the present massive structure and replacing it by an entirely new one. It we are considering the interests of river trade, let us bear in mind the damage done to that trade if we suffer a plan to be passed by this House which will have the effect of closing the river for a long period and closing the bridge to cross-river traffic for an equally long period.
There are other considerations besides that of navigation. There is the consideration of cost. I accept the figure of the hon. Member for East Fulham (Mr. Wilmot) that the difference between the two proposals is from £600,000 to £700,000. That is a vast sum of money, and unless there is good cause for spending it, I suggest that the House should not spend it. We are inclined to imagine that the time has come when we can spend money freely, but one of the most important instruments in promoting financial recovery has been the determination on the part of the House to spend no money on non-productive and unnecessary works, and the time has not yet come to reverse that policy which has been so successful in promoting financial recovery. One has only to look at the state of the world about us and the heavy burden of local and national taxation to realise that the vigilance of this House is as necessary as ever in order to see that no money is spent which is not amply justified by the needs of the people and the urgent necessities of the time. I am told that it is a small sum, but deficits are made up of small sums which are allowed to pass one after the other, and there is no case which would warrant the House in allowing this
sum to pass, by reversing its previous decision.
We are told also that four lines of traffic are not enough, and that we must have six. I impress upon the House that four lines of traffic across a bridge equal at least six, if not eight, on the highway. On the ordinary highway, made for six lines of traffic, one can always count on two lines being permanently blocked by cars and carts drawn up at the sides of the road. There are also the interruptions of traffic inevitable on a highway caused by the laying of pipes and mains and so forth, and four lines of traffic proceeding over this bridge means that there will debouch into the congested area at the end of the bridge a stream of traffic equivalent to six lines on the highway. I suggest that the state of affairs at Wellington Street offers no hope that we are going to improve matters by adding this amount of traffic to that already congested area. The whole case on that point was given away by ray hon. Friend the Minister of Transport when he said we had to look to the future. Wellington Street to-day is a bottle-neck and a difficult place. In the future, who knows that Covent Garden may not be swept away and great approaches made through there? Look at the money that is going to cost.
If you are going to make great approaches to Waterloo Bridge through Covent Garden it may cost, perhaps, £20,000,000. Why not spend your £20,000,000, where everyone is agreed a road bridge ought to be, at Charing Cross. One is reminded of the man who was ruined because his wife get a present of a very fine carpet and in order to live up to it, had to get a better house and indulge in all sorts of luxuries which he could not afford. We are beginning at the wrong place. Waterloo Bridge is not the solution for the chaotic condition of affairs south of the Thames. It is agreed that it is the Charing Cross Bridge that is required, and I suggest to the House that we shall be taking a false and irrevocable step if we allow our word to go forth that this old bridge is to be taken down.

Question put.

The House divided: Ayes, 194; Noes, 159.

Division No. 259.]
AYES.
[11.0 p.m.


Acland-Troyte, Lieut.-Colonel
Grigg, Sir Edward
Pickering, Ernest H.


Adams, Samuel Vyvyan T. (Leeds, W.)
Grimston, R. V.
Pike, Cecil F


Agnew, Lieut.-Com. P. G.
Hamilton, Sir R. W. (Orkney & Zetl'nd)
Purbrlck, R.


Anstruther-Gray, W. J.
Hanley, Dennis A.
Raikes, Henry V. A. M.


Applin, Lieut.-Col. Reginald V. K.
Harris, Sir Percy
Ramsay, T. B. W. (Western Isles)


Astor, Maj. Hn. John J. (Kent, Dover)
Haslam, Henry (Horncastle)
Rankin, Robert


Astor, Viscountess (Plymouth, Sutton)
Haslam, Sir John (Bolton)
Rathbone, Eleanor


Atholl, Duchess of
Hepworth, Joseph
Rea, Walter Russell


Baldwin-Webb, Colonel J.
Hornby, Frank
Rhys, Hon. Charles Arthur U.


Balfour, George (Hampstead)
Horobin, Ian M.
Ross, Ronald D.


Balfour, Capt. Harold (I. of Thanet)
Horsbrugh, Florence
Ross Taylor, Walter (Woodbridge)


Bateman, A. L.
Howitt, Dr. Alfred B.
Ruggles-Brise, Colonel E. A.


Beaumont, M. W. (Bucks., Aylesbury)
Hunter, Dr. Joseph (Dumfries)
Runge, Norah Cecil


Bennett, Capt. Sir Ernest Nathaniel
Hunter, Capt. M. J. (Brigg)
Russell, Alexander West (Tynemouth)


Bernays, Robert
Hurst, Sir Gerald B.
Russell, Hamer Field (Sheffield, B'tside)


Bevan, Stuart James (Holborn)
Hutchison, W. D. (Essex, Romf'd)
Rutherford, John (Edmonton)


Bossom, A. C.
Inskip, Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas W. H.
Rutherford, Sir John Hugo (Liverp'l)


Boulton, W. W.
Jessen, Major Thomas E.
Salt, Edward W.


Bowater, Col. Sir T. Vansittart
Joel, Dudley J. Barnato
Samuel, Sir Arthur Michael (F'nham)


Bower, Lieut.-Com. Robert Tatton
Johnstone, Harcourt (S. Shields)
Sandeman, Sir A. N. Stewart


Bowyer, Capt. Sir George E. W.
Jones, Sir G. W. H. (Stoke New'gton)
Savery, Samuel Servington


Boyd-Carpenter, Sir Archibald
Jones, Henry Haydn (Merioneth)
Scone, Lord


Bracken, Brendan
Kerr, Hamilton W.
Shaw, Helen B. (Lanark, Bothwell)


Brocklebank, C. E. R.
Keyes, Admiral Sir Roger
Shaw, Captain William T. (Forfar)


Brown, Ernest (Leith)
Kimball, Lawrence
Shepperson, Sir Ernest W.


Buchan-Hepburn, P. G. T.
Lamb, Sir Joseph Quinton
Shute, Colonel J. J.


Burghley, Lord
Law, Sir Alfred
Simmonds, Oliver Edwin


Butt, Sir Alfred
Leech, Dr. J. W.
Sinclair, Col. T. (Queen's Unv., Belfast)


Cadogan, Hon. Edward
Leighton, Major B. E. P.
Smith, Sir J. Walker- (Barrow-ln-F.)


Campbell, Sir Edward Taswell (Brmly)
Lennox-Boyd, A. T.
Somerville, Annesley A (Windsor)


Cayzer, Sir Charles (Chester, City)
Levy, Thomas
Southby, Commander Archibald R. J


Cazalet, Thelma (Islington, E.)
Llddall, Walter S.
Spencer, Captain Richard A.


Cecil, Rt. Hon. Lord Hugh
Lindsay, Kenneth (Kilmarnock)
Spens, William Patrick


Christie, James Archibald
Little, Graham-, Sir Ernest
Stewart, J. H. (Fife, E.)


Cobb, Sir Cyril
Llewellin, Major John J.
Stones, James


Conant, R. J. E.
Locker-Lampson, Rt. Hn. G. (Wd. Gr'n)
Storey, Samuel


Cook, Thomas A.
Loder, Captain J. de Vere
Strauss, Edward A.


Cooper, A. Duff
Lovat-Fraser, James Alexander
Stuart, Lord C. Crichton-


Courtauld, Major John Sewell
Macdonald, Sir Murdoch (Inverness)
Sutcliffe, Harold


Courthope, Colonel Sir George L.
McEwen, Captain J. H. F.
Tate, Mavis Constance


Crooke, J. Smedley
McKeag, William
Thomson, Sir Frederick Charles


Crookshank, Col. C. de Windt (Bootle)
McKle, John Hamilton
Touche, Gordon Cosmo


Crookshank, Capt. H. C. (Gainsb'ro)
McLean, Major Sir Alan
Tufnell, Lieut.-Commander R. L.


Croom-Johnson, R. P.
McLean, Dr. W. H, (Tradeston)
Turton, Robert Hugh


Cross, R. H.
Macquisten, Frederick Alexander
Ward, Lt.-Col. Sir A. L. (Hull)


Cruddas, Lieut.-Colonel Bernard
Maitland, Adam
Ward, Sarah Adelaide (Cannock)


Davies, Maj. Geo. F. (Somerset, Yeovil)
Manningham-Buller, Lt.-Col. Sir M.
Wardlaw-Milne, Sir John S.


Denville, Alfred
Margesson, Capt. Rt. Hon. H. D. R.
Waterhouse, Captain Charles


Donner, P. W.
Martin, Thomas B.
Watt, Captain George Steven H.


Drewe, Cedric
Mayhew, Lieut.-Colonel John
Wayland, Sir William A.


Duckworth, George A. V.
Mitchell, Harold P. (Br'tf'd & Chisw'k)
Wedderburn, Henry James Scrymgeour


Duggan, Hubert John
Moore, Lt.-Col. Thomas C. R. (Ayr)
White, Henry Graham


Edmondson, Major A. J.
Morgan, Robert H.
Whiteside, Borras Noel H.


Ellis, Sir R. Geoffrey
Morris, John Patrick (Salford, N.)
Williams, Charles (Devon, Torquay)


Emmott, Charles E. G. C.
Morrison, William Shephard
Wilson, Lt.-Col. Sir Arnold (Hertf'd)


Emrys-Evans, P. V.
Nall-Oain, Hon. Ronald
Wilson, Clyde T. (West Toxteth)


Evans, R. T. (Carmarthen)
Nicholson, Godfrey (Morpeth)
Wilson, G. H. A. (Cambridge U.)


Fermoy, Lord
Nicholson. Rt. Hn. W. G. (Petersf'ld)
Windsor-Clive, Lieut.-Colonel George


Fleming, Edward Lascelles
Nunn, William
Winterton, Rt. Hon. Earl


Ganzonl, Sir John
O'Connor, Terence James
Wise, Alfred R.


George, Megan A. Lloyd (Anglesea)
Oman, Sir Charles William C.
Wolmer, Rt. Hon. Viscount


Gluckstein, Louis Halle
O'Neill, Rt. Hon. Sir Hugh
Womersley, Walter James


Goff, Sir Park
Patrick, Colin M.



Goodman, Colonel Albert W.
Pearson, William G.
TELLERS FOR THE AYES.-


Gower, Sir Robert
Penny, Sir George
Sir William Davison and Lord


Greene, William P. C.
Peto, Sir Basil E. (Devon, Barnstaple)
Balniel.




NOES.


Adams, D. M. (Poplar, South)
Campbell-Johnston, Malcolm
Cripps, Sir Stafford


Albery, Irving James
Cape, Thomas
Culverwell, Cyril Tom


Allen, Sir J. Sandeman (Liverp'l, W.)
Caporn, Arthur Cecil
Daggar, George


Allen, Lt.-Col J. Sandeman (B'k'nh'd)
Carver, Major William H.
Davies, David L. (Pontypridd)


Aske, Sir Robert William
Cassels, James Dale
Davies, Rhys John (Westhoughton)


Attlee, Clement Richard
Castlereagh, Viscount
Dawson, Sir Philip


Banfield, John William
Chapman, Col. R. (Houghton-le-Spring)
Denman, Hon. R. D.


Barrie, Sir Charles Coupar
Clarke, Frank
Dlckle, John P.


Batey, Joseph
Clarry, Reginald George
Dobble, William


Beauchamp, Sir Brograve Campbell
Cocks, Frederick Seymour
Edwards, Charles


Beaumont, Hn. R. E. B. (Portsm'th, C.)
Colman, N. C. D.
Elliston, Captain George Sampson


Benn, Sir Arthur Shirley
Cooke, Douglas
Elmley, Viscount


Broadbent, Colonel John
Cove, William G.
Entwlstle, Cyril Fullard


Brown, C. W. E. (Notts., Mansfield)
Craddock, Sir Reginald Henry
Essenhlgh, Reginald Clare




Evans, David Owen (Cardigan)
Kerr, Lieut.-Col. Charles (Montrose)
Reed, Arthur C. (Exeter)


Fox, Sir Gifford
Kirkwood, David
Reid, William Allan (Derby)


Fraser, Captain Ian
Knight, Holford
Remer, John R.


Fremantle, Sir Francis
Knox, Sir Alfred
Renwick, Major Gustav A.


Gillett, Sir George Matterman
Lambert, Rt. Hon. George
Rlckards, George William


Glyn, Major Sir Ralph G. C.
Latham, Sir Herbert Paul
Ropner, Colonel L.


Goldie, Noel B.
Law, Richard K. (Hull, S. W.)
Rosbotham, Sir Thomas


Graham, D. M. (Lanark, Hamilton)
Lawson, John James
Salmon, Sir Isldore


Graves, Marjorle
Leckle, J. A.
Salter, Dr. Alfred


Greenwood, Rt. Hon. Arthur
Lees-Jones, John
Sanderson, Sir Frank Barnard


Grenfell, David Rees (Glamorgan)
Leonard, William
Selley, Harry R.


Grenfell, E. C. (City of London)
Llewellyn-Jones, Frederick
Shakespeare, Geoffrey H.


Griffith, F. Kingsley (Middlesbro', W.)
Lockwood, John C. (Hackney, C.)
Smiles, Lieut.-Col. Sir Walter D.


Griffiths, George A. (Yorks, W. Riding)
Loftus, Pierce C.
Smith, Bracewell (Dulwich)


Griffiths, T. (Monmouth, Pontypool)
Logan, David Gilbert
Smith, Louis W. (Sheffield, Hallam)


Groves, Thomas E.
Macdonald, Gordon (Ince)
Smith, Tom (Normanton)


Grundy, Thomas W.
McEntee, Valentine L.
Somervell, Sir Donald


Guy, J. C. Morrison
Maclean, Nell (Glasgow, Govan)
Soper, Richard


Hacking, Rt. Hon. Douglas H.
Mainwaring, William Henry
Spender-Clay, Rt. Hon. Herbert H.


Hales, Harold K.
Mallalieu, Edward Lancelot
Stanley, Hon. O. F. G. (Westmorland)


Hall, George H. (Merthyr Tydyll)
Mander, Geoffrey le M.
Sueter, Rear-Admiral Sir Murray F.


Hamilton, Sir George (Ilford)
Marsden, Commander Arthur
Sugden, Sir Wilfrid Hart


Hannon, Patrick Joseph Henry
Mason, David M. (Edinburgh, E.)
Taylor, Vice-Admiral E. A. (P'dd'gt'n, S.)


Harbord, Arthur
Meller, Sir Richard James
Thorne, William James


Harvey, George (Lambeth, Kenningt'n)
Mills, Sir Frederick (Leyton, E.)
Tinker, John Joseph


Headlam, Lieut.-Col. Cuthbert M.
Mills, Major J. D. (New Forest)
Tryon, Rt. Hon. George Clement


Heneage, Lieut.-Colonel Arthur P
Milner, Major James
Warrender, Sir Victor A. G.


Hicks, Ernest George
Mitchell, Sir W. Lane (Streatham)
West, F. R.


Hills, Major Rt. Hon. John Waller
Mitcheson, G. G.
Whyte, Jardine Bell


Holdsworth, Herbert
Morris-Jones, Dr. J. H. (Denbigh)
Williams, David (Swansea, East)


Hope, Capt. Hon. A. O. J. (Alton)
Munro, Patrick
Williams, Herbert G. (Croydon, S.)


Howard, Tom Forrest
Nation, Brigadier-General J. J. H.
Williams, Dr. John H. (Llanelly)


Hudson, Capt. A. U. M. (Hackney, N.)
O'Donovan, Dr. William James
Williams, Thomas (York, Dan Valley)


Jackson, Sir Henry (Wandsworth, C.)
Peat, Charles U.
Wills, Wilfrid D.


James, Wing.-Com. A. W. H.
Petherlck, M.
Wood, Sir Murdoch McKenzie (Banff)


Jenkins, Sir William
Powell, Lieut.-Col. Evelyn G. H.
Worthington, Dr. John V.


John, William
Pybus, Sir Percy John



Jones, J. J. (West Ham, Silvertown)
Radford, E. A.
TELLERS FOR THE NOES.—


Jones, Lewis (Swansea, West)
Ramsden, Sir Eugene
Sir George Hume and Mr. Wilmot.


Jones, Morgan (Caerphilly)
Ray, Sir William

Resolved,
That it be an Instruction to the Committee to which the Bill is referred that they amend Part I of the Schedule thereto by striking out in the second column, paragraph (c), of Item 7, the words 'or the demolition thereof and the erection of a new bridge.'

STATUTORY SALARIES (RESTORATION) [MONEY].

Resolution reported,
That it is expedient—

(a) to empower His Majesty to revoke the National Economy (Statutory Salaries) Order, 1931;
(b) to provide that while the said Order remains in force the abatement to be made thereunder from the salary to be paid out of the Consolidated Fund or out of moneys provided by Parliament in respect of any office shall, from and after the first day of July, nineteen hundred and thirty-four, be reduced by one-half;
(c) that any Act of the present Session for giving effect to the foregoing provisions of this Resolution should contain all such other incidental and consequential provisions as may be necessary for giving effect to the purposes aforesaid."

Resolution agreed to.

Bill ordered to be brought in upon the said Resolution by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir John Gilmour, and Mr. Hore-Belisha.

STATUTORY SALARIES (RESTORATION) BILL,

"to empower His Majesty to revoke the National Economy (Statutory Salaries) Order, 1931, and to provide that while the said Order remains in force the abatement to be made thereunder from any salary shall be reduced by one-half and for purposes connected with the matters aforesaid," presented accordingly, and read the First time; to be read a Second time upon Monday next, and to be printed. [Bill 125.]

FINANCE [GUARANTEED LOANS].

Resolution reported,
That, for the purpose of any Act of the present Session relating to finance, it is expedient to authorise—

(a) the issue out of the Consolidated Fund of any sums required for fulfilling any guarantee given by the Treasury under the said Act in respect of a loan issued solely for the purpose of providing for the redemption before maturity of another loan in respect of which a guarantee has been given (whether before
323
or after the passing of this Resolution) by the Treasury, subject to the Treasury having been satisfied before giving the first-mentioned guarantee that the substitution thereof for the guarantee of the loan to be redeemed Would benefit the Exchequer; and
(b) the payment into the Exchequer of any moneys paid in or towards repayment of any sum issued out of the Consolidated Fund as aforesaid."

Resolution agreed to.

MILITARY MANOEUVRES, 1934 MILITARY MANOEUVRES ACTS, 1897 AND 1911 (ORDERS IN COUNCIL).

Resolved,
That an humble Address be presented to His Majesty, praying His Majesty to make two Orders-in-Council under the Military Manoeuvres Acts, 1897 and 1911, drafts of which were presented to this House on the 13th day of February and 6th day of March last, respectively."—[Mr. Duff Cooper.]

The remaining Orders were read, and postponed.

EX-NAVAL MEN (COLOMBIAN ENGAGEMENT).

Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House do now adjourn."— [Commander Southby.]

11.17 p.m.

Mr. MANDER: I rise to call attention to the enlistment of certain British subjects in the Colombian Navy. The facts as I understand them are that 100 ex-British officers and naval ratings, some of them still on the Reserve, have enlisted for a period of from two to three years in the Colombian Navy. They are to man two 36-knot destroyers purchased, according to ray information, from Vickers. These destroyers are fitted with five 4.7 guns and eight tubes. I understand that no ammunition has been taken with them. That is to be sent out from England and the ships are to do their best to receive the ammunition, if they are successful in dodging the Peruvian Navy, which is to do its best to prevent the ammunition reaching them. I have, no word of criticism for these gallant officers and men. It is perfectly natural for them, with a feeling of professional pride in their calling, to take service where they
see it offered. Nor is it in the least surprising that other Navies should desire to enlist what are, after all, the finest seamen and the finest sea fighters in the whole world. That is all perfectly natural, but what does seem to me questionable and, at any rate, worth exploring, is the wisdom and the policy of allowing these enlistments, first, on general grounds and then in the particular circumstances of this case.
I know it is said—the First Lord has given me certain information—that these negotiations were carried out directly with the armament firm concerned and not with the Government. That is true, but none the less the Government, through the First Lord, had to give permission for these men to join. The First Lord defended his action the other day by saying that if he had objected he would have prevented men from getting employment, and that men of other nationalities would have been enlisted. Is that really a very strong argument? If it were carried to its logical conclusion it might be suggested that the unemployed of this country should join the armies and navies and air forces of the world, which would be very glad to get them, because they could not possibly get better people, and in that way the unemployment problem would be solved. I do not for a moment think that is the Government's idea—I give them the credit of that—for solving the unemployment problem.
I suggest that to say the reason for consenting was to provide employment is one that cannot be sustained. Surely we are not going to add to the expert of arms—about which there is so strong a feeling—the export of armed men. As a matter of public policy that seems to be undesirable. I cannot help thinking that it is very unfortunate that this enlistment has been permitted. War began between Colombia and Peru in September, 1932, because certain civilian Peruvians seized the Peruvian town of Leticia. Fighting took place in the early months of 1933. In February, 1933, diplomatic relations were broken off between these two countries and the League of Nations intervened. In January, 1933, the League took over the disputed territory of Leticia for one year. In May, 1934, a Protocol was signed
putting an end to the dispute between the two countries. That was only a very few days ago, and it is clear that these negotiations must have been going on at the time when diplomatic negotiations were certainly broken off between the two countries, and when there was the possibility of hostilities taking place again at the end of the year, and was anticipated in certain quarters.
For the Government to have consented in these circumstances to the enlistment of these men in the armed forces of one party to the dispute seems to me to be quite wrong. They were in fact strengthening one side in a dispute which was under the control of the League of Nations. Suppose that Peru had also asked for British sailors, would they have get them, too? Would the Government have had British subjects fighting on both sides in a wretched South American war. There was a possibility of one. I cannot help thinking that the explanation is that the position was not appreciated. I cannot believe that the Government seriously intended to get into a position of this kind. If that be so, is it not better to admit it frankly? Are we quite sure that fighting is over? I want to make one quotation, and I have finished. I saw a few days ago in the "Times" that it was stated from Trinidad:
A force of 1,650 Colombian officers and men sail to-night under the command of General Vargas to launch an attack on Peru, in spite of the reported agreement between Peru and Colombia about Leticia. The troops, in service kit but without arms, wandered about the streets of Port of Spain while the ships took in provisions, water, and fuel oil for the voyage up the Amazon tributary Putumayo, whence they will proceed overland towards the scene of action. …. It is understood that the Colombians seek to attack by land, but the Peruvians having a stronger native-manned navy prefer a sea action.
If war breaks out again, what is going to happen to these British subjects? Will they be recalled? I trust that the First Lord will be able to give us some information on the subject.

11.24 p.m.

The FIRST LORD of the ADMIRALTY (Sir Bolton Eyres Monsell): The latest attempt of the hon. Member for East Wolverhampton (Mr. Mander) is to hold this country up to international obloquy. [HON. MEMBERS: "Withdraw!"] The
chief misstatement that he has made in this case is that which he wrote for the "Manchester Guardian" and which he repeated here to-night. I quote what he said in the "Manchester Guardian":
The British Government have provided Colombia with British"——

Mr. MANDER: You said it.

Sir B. EYRES MONSELL: No, Sir. You said it, and it has nothing whatever to do with the British Government. All the officers and men who joined under contract with the Colombian Navy were retired officers and men. They freely enter into a contract with Colombia, and the British Government have no part whatsoever in it. This is still a free country.
The first point I want to make quite clear is that there is nothing on earth that this Government could have done effectively to prevent these men entering into this contract. There has been some talk about the Foreign Enlistment Act, and it is true that that Act gives us sanctions over our retired officers and men; but the Foreign Enlistment Act only comes into operation when two Powers with whom we are at peace are themselves at war. That does not apply in this case, because, as no one knows better than the hon. Gentleman, Colombia has never been at war. There have been no hostile actions of any sort taken since May, 1933, and now, happily, this unfortunate dispute is once for all, I believe, at an end.
It is true that, as the hon. Gentleman said just now, certain retired men have to ask the Admiralty for permission. Pensioners have to ask for permission before they leave the country, and retired officers have to ask for permission before they take service under a foreign Government. This permission is required because we may want those men. It may be urged that I should not have given permission, but, supposing that I had refused, it would not have stopped them joining if they were willing to give up their pension rights and their retired pay, because that is the only hold which the Admiralty has over them. I have already said in this House that, in the event of hostilities occurring in Colombia, the permission, for what it is worth, which I have given, will be reconsidered. Why should I refuse permission to these men? The
Colombians wanted sailors to man two ships which they had bought from Portugal. They wanted them to navigate the ships to South America, and to train the men that were going to take their place. As the hon. Gentleman said, the average contract is for two years. The commanding officer has a contract for five years, but in two years they will be able to train Colombians to take their place; and I understand that there is a clause in the contract which says that these men are not to be called upon to undertake any duties which might be contrary to their obligations as British subjects.
If Colombia had failed to get these men they would only have employed sailors from some other foreign country. What the hon. Member is really asking me to do is to deliberately withhold work from nearly 200 of our nationals and give the jobs to foreigners. Surety it is preferable to have British influence in the Colombian Navy rather than foreign influence. From the lowest standpoint we may expect to have some orders placed in this country instead of being given to foreigners. Even Wolverhampton may
benefit. There is a firm in Wolverhampton which is extremely well known to the hon. Member which has a big contract with the Admiralty to provide them with paint, and one may expect that, if these officers want some enamel for their ships, they will place the order in England rather than in a foreign country.
History has always shown that when the English have served in countries like South America they have been in favour of peaceful ordered development.
The hon. Member has asked me what would happen if Peru was in the same position. Peru is a very hypothetical case. I do not think there is the least likelihood of the case ever arising where two opposing navies will be manned by British sailors. If Peru was in the same position as Colombia, I should come to the hon. Member and his friends, because the dissident Liberals must have a wonderful amount of information on the subject of fighting on two sides.

It being Half-past Eleven of the Clock, Mr. SPEAKER adjourned the House, without Question put pursuant to the Standing Order.